Città e mercati in transizione nel Mediterraneo altomedievale. Contenitori da trasporto, merci e scambi a Siracusa tra età bizantina e islamica

Recent excavations in two urban contexts of Syracuse (Piazza Minerva and Foro Siracusano) have offered the opportunity to document and interpret stratigraphic sequences and associated materials from late roman to islamic period. The study of pottery from these contexts has allowed to achieve a seriation of the amphorae circulating in Syracuse between the byzantine and islamic period and to provide a more accurate definition of trade and commercial trans-mediterranean dynamics of the early medieval city. In the 7th century archaeological layers, the African, Eastern and "Italic" amphorae prevail. From the 8th century contexts show a wide presence of large globular amphorae from different productions, mainly coming from eastern Mediterranean. These materials underline that Syracuse was a fundamental knot of the Mediterranean trade flows of wine and salsamenta importation and sicilian wheat exportation. Between the end of the 8th and the 9th century, the growth of regional amphorae become evident, during a period of strong political and socio-economic stress caused by the beginning of the Islamic conquest of the island. From the early islamic period (late 9th century) the amphorae show a morphological transformation with a new, typical, islamic shape of regional production. They are assembled with a consistent presence of transport containers from southern Italy and aegean regions, which underline still the strong connection with the areas of byzantine culture. From the second half of the 10th to the 11th century the contexts show a picture where the Islamic regional amphorae are the only one transport containers. The importations are more episodic and irregular than the previous periods.