Archaeology Magazine - January/February 1980 - 31

cavated example. In 1979 we found yet another
spring at San Angelo Vecchio. Just like Pizzica,
there was a ceramic complex with, in this instance,
four well-preserved kilns and evidence for a cult
of Zeus. Similar structures probably existed outside any Greek city that depended heavily on agriculture. When the fourth-century b.c. lyric poet
Leonidas of Taras described the experience of a
traveler stopping at a spring to offer a drinking
cup to the nymphs, he must have been recounting
a common country experience.
The three sites in the Metaponto chora Incoronata, Fattoria Stefan and Pizzica- clearly
show how the inhabitants of the countryside lived,
worked, worshipped and obtained their water. But
who were they? The question of who made up the
agricultural work force in the Greek and Roman
worlds is one which has long preoccupied historians. Were they slaves? Or independent farmers?
Houses like Fattoria Stefan probably did not belong to slaves, but to farmers of modest means.
The best evidence is provided by burials. It has
not always been easy to distinguish a farmer's
grave from a city dweller's, since the urban necropolis or burial ground was almost always located outside the ancient city. Rural burials have
not often been recognized as a result. In 1976 we
had an unusual opportunity to carry out a salvage
excavation in the chora at Saldone, some eight
kilometers from the city walls of Metaponto. After
three weeks' work, we had discovered some 30
graves and are now able to describe a complete
or nearly complete rural family burial ground.
The plan of the Saldone cemetery shows a
cluster of adult and children's burials around one
grave which contained the skeleton of a young
male. The unusually fine grave goods included
two strigils, metal instruments used by athletes to
clean their bodies after exercise. A water jar (hydria) was placed at his feet, one owl cup was in the
mouth and a second lay nearby. The hydria, on
which a rare scene of Zeus in pursuit of a nymph
(perhaps Aigina) appears, was decorated by the
first South Italian painter of vases in the red-

figure styles- a person known as the Pisticci
Painter, after the nearby town where a number of
his works were discovered. He was trained in
Athens and, for all we know, may have come to
southern Italy as part of Perikles' colony at Thurii
near Sybaris with the historian Herodotus. In any
event, he painted the hydria in about 430 b.c.,
and probably also made the two owl cups. An
amphora with a sagging belly, known as a pelike,
was found in another grave and is certainly the
work of the Pisticci Painter's more innovative colleague, the Amykos Painter. It depicts Eros seated
on a rock and dates to about 420 b.c.
For the most part, however, the grave goods
were not made by painters of the first order. Most
were simply plain black-glazed pottery, but they
do permit us to establish fairly precise dates for
the burial ground. It was in use for roughly a
century from 480 to 380 b.c., with the greatest
activity in the last half of the fifth century b.c.
The types of tombs range from elaborate cists
lined with stone slabs to simple earthen graves.
The latter sometimes contained only the skeleton
without grave goods; the former had mostly been
robbed very recently by clandestine diggers. In the
medium range were the graves covered with slabs
and those covered with enormous terracotta tiles
especially made for burials. A child's grave was
normally covered with a single large roof tile.
A comparison of the types of tombs, burial
methods and accompanying grave goods from the
rural Saldone necropolis with those of urban
Metaponto demonstrates beyond any doubt that
the farmers who were buried at Saldone were
culturally the same people who lived in the city of
Metaponto. For example, the numerous strigils
discovered at Saldone mirror the fashion in the
urban necropolis of characterizing the deceased
male as an athlete. Yet the burials in each locality

The two kilns in the westwing of the late Republicantile
factory discoveredon the hillsideat Pizzica (150-50B.C.).The
larger kiln, usedfor the productionof roof tilesand heavy
coarseware pottery, was protectedfrom the evil spirits by a very
large phallic stela plated besidethefiring hole. The smaller
kun with the arched grill over the combustionchamberstill
intact was usedfor pottery.

1980
Januaiy/Februaiy

Archaeology Magazine - January/February 1980

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Archaeology Magazine - January/February 1980