Megaliths in Puglia
The megaliths in Apulia are the only ones in the area of Rome and Naples (Pian Sultano) and the foothills of the Swiss complexes in Saint Martin de Corléans in the Aosta Valley , individual specimens in Piedmont and Liguria ( dolmen of Monticello ), along with a small group of stone boxes in mainland Italy. In 1956 they were divided into the Bari-Taranto group (see Taranto or gallery grave ) and the Otranto group ( dolmen ) by J. D. Evans . Hypogea such as that of Trinitapoli , as well as menhirs , specchie (Cairns) and rock tombs such as that of Massafra , complete the prehistoric picture of this region. There are 21 preserved dolmens and 79 menhirs in Puglia.
The Bari Taranto group
The gallery-like systems in this group can be short (approx. 3 m) or up to 17 m long. They are always rectangular and made of sheet material. Individual systems are surrounded by dry masonry. In most of the plants there are indications of an oval or rectangular, but broken hill. The Corato and Giovinazzo systems are segmented on the inside. Giovinazzo has a circular forecourt - possibly a place for rituals. The mostly east-west oriented systems have their entrance in the east. There are signs of soul hole access . The Bisceglie and Leucaspide plants have a separate antechamber. Only the facilities of Bisceglie Dolmen di Chianca and Giovinazzo, which were discovered late, still contained grave goods and skeletal material. Middle Helladic pottery indicates that Giovinazzo was still around 1700 BC. Was in use. The gallery or cairn of Giovinazzo is near Bari. With a length of 17 m, it is the most imposing. It was hidden under a mound of earth until it was found. It was cut in two when it was discovered when a farmer drove a bulldozer through the hill in an effort to level his farmland.
The Otranto Group
The southernmost group of mainland Italian systems , also known as Salento , consists of dolmens and is located in the province of Lecce , mostly near Otranto. It comprised about 30 systems, which differ significantly from the Bari-Taranto type. They do not give any references to former hills and do not have a uniform orientation. The dolmens, which are only about one meter high, are megalithic . Their chambers are oval, round or polygonal. They are two to four meters long. Up to eight bearing stones carry the capstone. In contrast to the Bari-Taranto group, they have pits, markings and bowls on the tops of the capstones . The best preserved of the group is that of the Scusi dolmen near Minervino di Lecce . A large group lies at Giurdignano . The dolmen Gurgulante and Placa near Melendugno and the dolmen Cranzari near Zollino (all immediately south of Lecce) are the northernmost examples of this group. The dolmen "Argentina" in the extreme south is a semi- hypogeum ; its chamber was cut into the rock , only its access above ground is formed by megaliths.
Time position
There are no C-14 data and therefore the typology of the additions determines the classification of the Bari Tarento monuments. The additions are assigned to the B phase of the Proto-Apennine Culture, which is classified between 2300 and 1750, i.e. the late Bronze Age . These megalithic systems are among the latest in the Mediterranean region.
The nearly empty Otrantodolmen did not provide any clues for their temporal determination. Initially, neither additions nor skeletal material were found in them, but today there is no longer any doubt about their funerary function. Dolmen Cosi south of Gallipoli were obsidian found shards and human bones.
The initial situation led British researchers to initially regard the two groups as not existing at the same time. In the search for parallels, they were compared with the Maltese systems of the simultaneous Tarxien phase (see Temple of Tarxien ). An argument against such a connection is that the Apulian grounds (the dolmens in some cases very close) are accompanied by menhirs and statue menhirs , which are completely absent on Malta. The Scusi and Chiancuse systems even have rectangular holes in the stone in their immediate vicinity. It is believed that they originally served as a base for menhirs. Other researchers compared the Apulian with the central Italian stone boxes (by Pian Sultano) or with Sardinian systems. Architecturally, however, it is more likely to connect the dolmens of the Bari region (Albarosa, Frisari, Chianca dei Paladini) made from flat panels with those in the Aude region in southern France .
Specchie
Specchie are circular monuments made of rubble or dry stone masonry. Like the unexcavated Irish Cairns (Heapstone, Knocknarea ), they are counted among the megalithic monuments. They are concentrated west of Brindisi in an area between Ceglie Messapica, Villa Castelli and Francavilla Fontana; smaller ones are in the Salent. The Specchia Miano (at Ceglie Messapica) has a diameter of 20 and a height of 11 meters.
Menhirs and statue menhirs
Statue menhirs
Statue menhirs are a Bronze Age phenomenon that is primarily associated with Sardinia, Corsica and continental Western Europe, including Western Switzerland. A group of small statues (about 1 m high) that is completely isolated and difficult to determine in terms of time can be found near the village of Castelluccio dei Sauri in the Foggia region of Apulia. They are scratched in a very rustic style and decorated with busts and necklaces. A much finer dagger-decorated fragment was found just a few kilometers away at Mattinata (Tor di Lupa) in a secondary position in a wall.
Menhirs
The 79 Apulian menhirs are partly geometric and very slender (Casamassima) with a height of up to 4.7 m (de lu Chiofilu near Martano). Others have anthropomorphic or dew-cross-like ( Menhir of Vardare in Diso) proportions. Many are in the olive groves near the dolmens. A larger group lies west of Bari between Sovereto, Terlizzi and Bitonto. In Sammichele di Bari and at Cannae there are menhirs of the same name. In Lecce, the Zollino menhirs and some of the Muro Leccese menhirs are of considerable length.
See also
literature
- Alastair Service & Bradbery J .: The standing Stones of Europe , London 1979 pp. 78-83
- Giuseppe Antonucci: Salento preistorico menhir, dolmen, specchia, grotto
- MA Orlando: Presenze necropoliche e strutture funerarie nel Salento dal XVI al X sec. AC In: Studi di Antichità, VIII \ 2 (1995), pp. 19-38.
- R. Whitehouse: The Megalithic Monuments of South-East Italy , New Series, Vol. 2, No. 3 (1967) pp. 347-365
