Normas internacionales

As mentioned above, there does not exist for Italy a single relative chronology for the Bronze Age, and it has been necessary to work according to certain chosen typologies (see below). No advantage was seen in producing a new typology: revision of all the material would be a major research project in itself, and there is no reason to ignore previous work since there are no major doubts about the sequence (problems lying in the attachment of single types to one or other specific chronological phase and, far more importantly, on the attachment of phases to calendar dates: in relative typologies the latter has had so far no firm base on reality, but rather on assumptions about it.) It was, thus.

preferred to use established typologies.

The criteria for selection have been that the typologies be of recent compilation, generally accepted by Italian archaeologists (that is, used in other works for chronological determination), at least regional in scope but yet detailed, free from cultural attributions, inclusive of a variety of material and not only pottery, and, whenever possible, built with a view to settlement analysis. These requirements proved too demanding in some occasions: when considering the 12th to 10th centuries in Central Italy comprehensive typologies for the pottery simply do not exist (the reasons for this are succinctly but clearly expressed in Fugazzola Delpino and Delpino 1979: 308), a confirmation, perhaps, of the inability of pottery to define a chronological system valid for settlements, since this seems to have been a period of important settlement change, marked by a highly local orientation of pottery production. In the summary typology, therefore, pottery types for this period have not been included more than in generic terms, except for the last phase for which the evidence is slightly better.

The work here presented is based on the typologies defined by Capoferri (1987), Cocchi Genick et a l (1991/92), Macchiarola (1987), Fugazzola Delpino (1976) and Peroni (1989) for the Middle and Recent Bronze Age; Bicego (1988-89), Leonardi (1979), Fugazzola Delpino and Delpino (1979), Peroni (1989), and Potter (1976) for the Final Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age. A synthesis of all the different typologies has been made both for pottery and bronze, unifying terminology and solving slight differences in the chronological division into phases and the association of some particular types with a specific chronological phase. Whenever the typology for bronze objects has not been covered or updated by the above publications, the chronology used is that proposed by the various studies on Italy published in the Prahistorische Bronzefunde (Bianco Peroni 1970, 1976; Carancini 1975 and 1984) and in Carancini 1979 and 1991/92. The summary typology appears as Appendix II, preceded by a glossary with the chosen English renderings of the most common Italian terms.

In building up the combined relative chronology, it proved necessary to bridge two imposing gaps. The first one was the artificial conceptual gap between the Late and the

Final Bronze Age (between the 13th/12th and the 11 th centuries in traditional relative chronology). The transition from one to the other is usually taken as a very clear break shown in the non-continuity of settlement (Peroni 1989: 84; Di Gennaro 1991/92). Yet the division is not so readily observable in the material, and the period remains one of transition, for which the chronology has been slightly revised. This is another case in which settlement and material culture appear to have clearly diachronic phases.

The second gap is a spatial one: the need to unite the Etruscan and Venetian chronologies. The comparison of two areas with diverse material culture necessitates the existence of a sequence that permits us to link the local typologies. Traditionally this has been done by studying the bronzes, since ceramic typology and decoration do not normally allow more than the identification of chronological correspondences based on typological affinity. The link is sought, thus, in the typology of bronze objects (bronze being a more specialised type of production than pottery and which to an extent requires the existence of specialised manufacturing centres that escape local barriers). Although it is generally accepted here that bronze objects were the work of specialised craftsmen and that the types were probably in use at approximately the same time in both areas (Carancini 1991/92: 250), the use of the bronze typology as a link for the local pottery typologies suffers from three serious drawbacks:

1) it is constructed mainly on the bronzes found in hoards (the main source of bronze finds until they become more common in settlements and burials by the end of the Bronze Age). Their contextual isolation means that bronzes are difficult to relate chronologically to the very pottery sequences they are supposed to unify.

2) bronzes are also known to be capable of surviving throughout time as heirlooms and prestige objects, a fact which creates problems for their role as a chronological bridge.

3) for most of the Bronze Age the typology is built, as with the pottery, on the grounds of typological affinity rather than on common types. Consequently, the more numerous Northern Italian finds create a bias which negatively affects their linking role with Etruria.

When the Central and Northern Italian sequences are linked exclusively on the grounds of local relative typologies, it becomes very difficult to have any real sense of

the nature of developments and their relation: the repercussions for the study of settlement nucléation are clearly serious. The link between them must be provided by a source other than relative typologies, even if these will provide more precise divisions once the general phases are established. It is only in the use of absolute time indicators that an independent link could be found for both areas.