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SITE HISTORY
The Mugello Valley Archaeological Project
is an Etruscan excavation project in Tuscany, Italy, directed
by Professor Gregory Warden, Southern Methodist University, and
Professor Michael Thomas, University of Michigan. The project
is jointly sponsored by Southern Methodist University and by
the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
 Archives
View of the Mugello Valley,
northeast of Florence in Tuscany, Italy.
This long-term project centers on Poggio
Colla, a site in the Mugello region of Tuscany, near the modern
town of Vicchio, about twenty miles northeast of Florence. Poggio
Colla was first excavated from 1968 to 1972 by Dr. Francesco
Nicosia, the former Superintendent for the Archaeology of Tuscany.
With Dr. Nicosia's permission and encouragement, the excavations
have continued to reveal a site whose excavation promises to
contribute tremendously to our knowledge of Etruscan Italy.
Map of the environs of Poggio
Colla and Vicchio di Mugello.
Poggio Colla was left untouched between
1972 and 1995, when the SMU/Penn excavations (Mugello Valley
Archaeological Project) began. The initial season of the MVAP
was conducted during July 1995, and excavation has progressed
on an annual basis since that initial campaign. The excavation
season normally runs from mid-June to the beginning of August.
View of Vicchio in the Mugello
Valley from the southwest.
Poggio Colla is important because it has
undisturbed habitation layers that span much of Etruscan history.
The site seems to have been inhabited by the Etruscans at least
as early as the seventh century and was abandoned or destroyed
in the late third century BCE. Excavations to date have revealed
well-defined fortification walls, an extensive necropolis area,
and the rare remains of an archaic monumental building, probably
a temple. Poggio Colla was inhabited at least as early at the
seventh century BCE, and had monumental architecture on its north-eastern
flank, probably a temple, by the early sixth century. The site
suffered a violent destruction and was then rebuilt during the
Hellenistic period. Remains of the Hellenistic fortifications
can still be seen on the three sides of the Poggio today.
Fortification walls at Poggio
Colla.
Excavation of Etruscan habitation sites
has been rare, although in the past few decades some important
habitation sites (for instance Murlo and Acquarossa) have increased
our knowledge of Etruscan life substantially. Still, the Etruscans
are known primarily from funerary remains, and much of our knowledge
of Etruscans comes from the wealthy southern centers, Veii, Caere,
and Tarquinia. One of the problems is that the Etruscans chose
their sites so well that the major centers were repeatedly built
upon in the Medieval and later periods. We know where the Etruscans
had their major cities, places like Volterra, Orvieto, Cortona,
and Fiesole, but the sites are covered over with modern towns
or cities and are therefore almost impossible to excavate. Poggio
Colla thus offers us an exceptional opportunity, to excavate
and study an important Etruscan settlement, and to do so with
up-to-date methods and technologies. The site of Poggio Colla
should prove singularly important for the information it will
provide about Etruscan urbanization, architecture, and daily
life.
View to the north from the
plateau of Poggio Colla.
Of further importance is the archaeological
topography of the Mugello basin, a region at the edge of the
Apennines at the north-eastern periphery of Etruscan territory.
This area is little-known archaeologically but could provide
important information about Etruscan connections and trade routes
with their Italic neighbors to the north and along the Adriatic
coast to the east. Poggio Colla is located at a strategic location
at the point where the broad Mugello basin narrows into the Sieve
River Valley (Val di Sieve) that forms a natural communication
route to the Arno, and hence to the region around Florence (Agro
Fiorentino, as it was dubbed by Nicosia). The site is actually
made up of two plateaus with a saddle of land in between. The
northernmost plateau, Monte Sassi, has a dominant position over
modern Vicchio and the Mugello. Poggio Colla, on the other hand,
dominates the Val di Sieve and affords a more protected location.
For other scholarly reports and information,
see the following:
Co-Directors: Gregory
Warden gwarden@mail.smu.edu and Michael Thomas
mlthomas@mail.utexas.edu
Excavation house phone during the
field season: (011-39) 055-844-9834
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