From the perspective of the source. Neolithic production and exchange of Monte Arci Obsidians (Central-Western Sardinia)

The paper deals with the modes of Neolithic obsidian exploitation on the Sardinian source of Monte Arci, according to an integrated typo-technological/provenance approach. It focuses on the main changes in raw material selection and distribution criteria. Whilst from Early to Middle Neolithic they seem to have been influenced by technological and cultural factors, in Late Neolithic a dramatic shift in production behaviour is recorded. Then increased production rates are reflected in the appearance of a true structured exchange network which exerts bidirectional cultural and technological influences in the Northern Tyrrhenian region

Chert exploitation and production in Sardinia during the Neolithic

This research deals with the modes of chert exploitation in Sardinia during the Neolithic, combining information on major chert sources identified across the island with the technological analysis on several stratigraphic reliable series. It focuses on the changes in raw material selection and on the evolution of technological behaviours between the 6th and the 4th millennium BCE. The data collected in this work allowed us either to shed a light on the role this lithic resource played in the production systems of Neolithic communities in Sardinia, and to catch differences in the modes of procurement, depending on the chronology and location of the sites. During the Early Neolithic, lithic raw material circulation in Sardinia did not occur through organized networks, but it seems to have relied on the high mobility of the local groups. It is only at the end of the 5th millennium BCE that well-organized exchange circuits started operating. These involved mainly obsidian and this raw material apparently consolidated in time, due to the role carried out by San Ciriaco and Ozieri Middle to Late Neolithic cultures in the control and development of the Monte Arci obsidian supply. Chert was never involved in these networks and was mainly exploited locally and opportunistically. However, from the end of the Neolithic, some outcrop in the Oligo-Miocene basin of Perfugas was exploited on a supra-local scale and for a relatively short period

L'obsidienne néolithique en Méditerranée occidentale

L'ossidiana è uno degli indicatori privilegiati di interazione tra le comunità neolitiche del Mediterraneo occidentale. Attraverso l'analisi diacronica dello sfruttamento delle quattro sorgenti insulari di questa materia prima presenti nella regione, seguendo un approccio che integra tecniche di caratterizzazione della provenienza ed analisi tipo-tecnologica delle industrie, vengono focalizzate le tendenze alla progressiva strutturazione di differenti reti di scambio. Attraverso questi canali si seguono i processi di cambiamento delle entità culturali e l'evoluzione nelle forme di organizzazione del sistema di produzione litica, riflesso del progressivo mutamento del valore assegnato all'ossidiana

Monte Arci Obsidians: Some More Geochemical Data from EMP-WDS, SEM-EDS and PIXE

We bring new geochemical data on Monte Arci (Sardinia) obsidians from elemental analyses by electron microprobe (EMP) and proton-induced X-ray emission (PIXE). Obsidians from the geochemical groups SA, SB1, SB2 and SC can be sorted out from their major element contents by EMP and from their trace element contents by PIXE. While EMP analysis requires for analysis a few milligrams polished fragment, PIXE is strictly non-destructive. Forty samples were part of a program aimed at the geochemical characterization of Monte Arci secondary sources

Intra-source provenance study on Monte Arci (Sardinia) obsidian by pXRF: Role of the data acquisition and analysis tools

In this work, a detailed study of Monte Arci obsidian sub-sources using the increasingly accessible technique of pXRF is presented based upon a large dataset of 68 geological samples, for the development of X-ray fluorescence-based analytical standardless procedure. In addition, a non-conventional (for obsidian provenance study) direct application of multivariate analysis on XRF spectra (continuous variables), rather than absolute concentrations or intensity ratios (discrete variables) is proposed. Results from different softwares and data analysis approaches (bi-/trivariate versus multivariate) were compared. In a blind test, the bi-/trivariate approach led to the correct assignment for the main SA, SB, and SC sub-sources, taking into account averaged values of intensity ratios with their standard deviation obtained from three independent measurements. A high intra-source variability for the SB subgroups was detected (almost 13% of error in the assignment, 9 samples out of 68). A non-conventional application of multivariate analysis was carried out directly on the XRF spectra and correct assignments were obtained for SA, SB1, SC groups, while 71% of the SB2 samples were correctly identified. The non-destructive analysis on 14 archaeological samples from Su Carroppu (Carbonia, southwestern Sardinia) rockshelter and from the Middle Neolithic (MN) 422 structure of the open-air dwelling site at Cuccuru is Arrius (Cabras, central-western Sardinia) permitted to test the method and hypothesise their provenance. The comparison with visual characterization or previous analyses by Particle Induced X-Ray Emission (PIXE) permitted to verify the correct provenance assignment of all artifacts for the bi-/trivariate method, and for 12/14 samples in the case of the multivariate one. The standardless analytical approach proposed in this work can represent a more general method exploitable for other obsidian sources, other glassy materials, besides other materials of archaeological interest

Intestinal Microbial Ecology and Fillet Metal Chemistry of Wild Grey Mullets Reflect the Variability of the Aquatic Environment in a Western Mediterranean Coastal Lagoon (Santa Giusta, Sardinia, Italy)

Fish populations play an active role in the maintenance of aquatic ecosystems biodiversity. Their intestinal microbiota and fillet chemistry depend on abiotic and biotic factors of the water environments that they inhabit. The present study investigated the grey mullets' gut microbiota from a transitional aquatic ecosystem (Santa Giusta Lagoon, Sardinia, Italy) by a multidisciplinary approach which refers the results of (1) gut cultivable microbiota analyses (MA), (2) the trace metal assessment of fish muscle (TM), (3) the physico-chemical water monitoring (PC). MA detected the greatest number of total aerobic heterotrophic bacteria, Enterobacteriaceae and coliforms in Autumn (mean values 1.3 × 105, 2.4 × 104, 1.1 × 104 cfu g−1, respectively) when the accumulated rain and mean values of nutrients (reactive phosphorous and silica) were the highest. Marine bacteria were more numerous in Summer (mean value 7.4 × 105 cfu g−1) when the highest mean values of water temperature and salinity were registered. The gut bacteria were identified as Pseudomonas spp. (64%), Aeromonas spp. (17%), Ochrobactrum pseudogrignonense (10%), Providencia spp. (5%), Enterobacter ludwigii (2%) and Kocuria tytonicola (2%). TM showed that Ca, Na, B and Ni increased their concentrations in Winter while maxima of P, Zn, Cu and Fe were found in muscles of fish sampled in Summer. This study highlighted that the fish intestinal microbiota and metal composition of the fillet reflected the seasonal aquatic environmental variability

Obsidian Economy in the Rio Saboccu Open-Air Early Neolithic Site (Sardinia, Italy)

Integrated provenance/typo-technologic/chaînes opératoires studies on obsidians from Early Neolithic (EN) assemblages are still quite exceptional in the western Mediterranean region. The Rio Saboccu S1-S2 EN dwelling structures (Central-western Sardinia) 14C dated to the last three centuries of the VIth millennium BC provided us with an opportunity to apply such an approach. A comprehensive provenance study of its 1.114 obsidian artefacts was realized through a combined visual/instrumental approach. Elemental compositions were determined mostly by ion beam analysis (PIXE) and by electron microprobe (SEM-EDS). The S1-S2 structures are situated inside the so-called supply zone of the Monte Arci volcanic complex. A technological analysis of the implements revealed a non-opportunistic behaviour in relation to obsidian procurement among the four (SA, SB1, SB2, SC) Monte Arci types locally available in various contexts (from primary to secondary sources). A comparison with other Sardinian EN sites suggests that the human groups settled near the Monte Arci sources might have acted as a ‘filter’ in the first stages of the diffusion of obsidians in Sardinia and possibly elsewhere in the northern Tyrrhenian area

Your path led trough the sea ... The emergence of Neolithic in Sardinia and Corsica

The emergence of Neolithic in Sardinia and Corsica has more and more the aspect of a sharp rupture that led to the first permanent occupation of the islands through a process of diffuse and rapid territorialization. To date, any evidence of contiguity is still lacking between first Neolithic implantations and last Mesolithic frequentations that stretch sporadically over more than two millennia, until the 8.2 kyear cold climatic event. Besides, Mesolithic-Neolithic discontinuity is proved not only archaeologically, on the grounds of stratigraphy, settlement strategies, and technological systems. Indeed, new mitochondrial DNA genome sequences from Mesolithic Sardinia provide evidence of a substantial diversity between the two populations. The earliest stages (scouting phase) of Neolithic colonization of the islands are scarcely documented thus far, even if some clues would place them consistently in the flow of the Neolithic expansion towards the western Mediterranean. Around the central centuries of the 6th millennium cal BC, the following step (consolidation phase) corresponds to the formation and spread of the Cardial impressed ware facies along the coastal belt of the central and north Tyrrhenian shore. Since then, both Sardinia-Corsica and the Tyrrhenian strands opposite to this region reveal an almost symmetrical and synchronous rhythm of evolution. In the last centuries of the 6th millennium cal BC, new influences coming from the North of the Italian mainland, possibly through the mediation of the Tyrrhenian Linear Carved ware facies, acted as a push factor towards the recombination of the shared traditional traits into new original cultures. In the two islands, at the end of this trajectory, the process of neolithization was almost accomplished and the evolution of Neolithic cultures, although interlinked, went on separately afterwards

E la dea divenne madre… Una figurina di gestante dall’insediamento neolitico di San Giovanni a Terralba (OR)

Le figurine antropomorfe femminili del pieno Neolitico sono ampiamente diffuse in Sardegna, con caratteristiche formali e stilistiche oggetto da tempo di numerose riflessioni e proposte di classificazione e seriazione cronologica. A prescindere dai contesti e dalle situazioni di riferimento, questa categoria di manifestazione del simbolismo delle società neolitiche è pressoché universalmente ritenuta indicativa della diffusione di una celebrazione (cultuale?) della fertilità e della maternità, più o meno fedelmente ricalcanti il concetto archeo-mitologico della Dea madre elaborato da Marija Gimbutas (1974). Tra i numerosi esemplari conosciuti rinvenuti in Sardegna, tuttavia, molto pochi restituiscono la rappresentazione di una figura femminile inequivocabilmente gravida, a veicolare in forma esplicita il presupposto messaggio della maternità. In questa sede si presenta un inedito esemplare miniaturistico proveniente dal sito di San Giovanni a Terralba e si affacciano sinteticamente alcune considerazioni sugli aspetti contestuali, funzionali e simbolici del tipo.Several Late to Final Neolithic female figurines largely spread in Sardinia bear some formal and stylistic characteristics which gave rise to many remarks as well as proposals of classification and chronological seriation. Aside from each context and place of reference, this category of symbolic expression among Neolithic communities is generally considered to suggest the spread of a cult of fecundity and motherhood, roughly shaped from the archaeo-mythological concept of Marija Gimbutas’ Mother Goddess (1974). Yet, in the number of well-known figurines found in Sardinia, very few portray unambiguously pregnant female figures, to suggest the purported message of a patent motherhood. In this paper I present an unpublished specimen of this category coming from the open-air site of San Giovanni at Terralba, and briefly discuss some issue about the context, function and symbolic value of this type of anthropomorphic representation