Micromorphological study of concotto surfaces protected by the Avellino Eruption in 3,780 BP at the Afragola village in Southern Italy

Summary

The term concotto refers to fragments or patches of hard heated clay that derive from living surfaces, walls and ovens. Concotto fragments are found throughout the Italian peninsula and date from the Neolithic to the Iron Age. Current studies express contradictory opinions about whether or not the concottos found on living surfaces represent intentionally constructed surfaces or the secondary products of the contact between hot embers and sediments. This study uses micromorphological analysis to investigate the function and composition of concotto surfaces from several domestic structures at the Early Bronze Age village of Afragola in southern Italy. Afragola is an exceptionally preserved agricultural village that was covered by almost 1 meter of ash during the Vesuvius eruption in 3,780 BP. The concottos at Afragola are hard, red surfaces that are typically associated with burned materials. Micromorphological analysis reveals that the concottos were intentionally made by laying down patches of clay and then heating them to create a hard, flat surface. This study explores the potential uses of the concotto as cooking surfaces during the Early Bronze Age of southern Italy.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Anthropic activity markers: archaeology and ethnoarchaeology   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage