Paesaggi produttivi della frontiera arabo-bizantina in Sicilia sud-orientale (IX-XI secolo)

Abstract

As a frontier zone between the two main empires of Early Medieval Mediterranean (Byzantium and Islam), the vast insular territory of Sicily was the object, for over two and a half centuries (827-1091), of the convergence and clash of competing social and economic systems, which inevitably redefined its historical landscape and the history of its material culture. The aim here is to present the first insights from a multidisciplinary archaeological analysis of a crucial area in south-eastern Sicily, located along important road axes and passages from the fertile plains of central Sicily to the Iblei mountains, from which the accesses to Syracuse, capital of the Byzantine thema, are controlled. This case-study has the main objective of showing the potential of a sociological approach to the historical-landscape investigation of these territories, deeply affected by the constant updating of territorial hierarchies, structures and modes of production and consumption of artefacts, which in the course of these centuries reformulated the complex historical habitus in this frontier social world: By enhancing these aspects and investigating them through the reconstruction of the social life of artefacts - production, circulation, consumption, reuse and waste - it is indeed possible to focus attention on the changing landscape and production references that individuals had in occupying this border area.