TORRETTA DI PIETRAGALLA
Potenza, Basilicata,
Italy.
An indigenous center of ancient habitation
at the W boundary of the territory of this community.
Its position on a hill more than 1000 m high, controlled
a large part of the ancient road from Melfi and Venusia
to Potentia, and settlements at Carpine di Cancellara,
Acerenza, Oppido Lucano, and Serra di Vaglio.
The remains include three fortified areas with perfectly cut blocks showing quarry marks in Greek letters. The highest area of the town was defended by a
fortification which reaches a height of 3.4 m; to this area, which appears as an acropolis, is joined another fortification also built in blocks cut in the Greek style and bearing quarry marks in Greek letters. This second
fortification is reached from the first by means of a door.
Excavations reveal that a trapezoidal tower was built,
probably at a later time, at the NW corner of this fortification. Below these two fortifications a third, finished only on the NE side, has been found. These fortified areas, like those of the indigenous centers mentioned,
date, in their earliest sections, from the second half
of the 4th c. B.C.
Pottery and bronzes from the end of the 7th or the
beginning of the 6th c. B.C. give clear evidence, however,
of earlier habitation of the area. It has not been possible so far to establish the outlines of fortifications existing in this earlier period. Both the pottery and the bronzes are typical of the area's production of ancient
Lucania in archaic times. Among the artistic remains
characteristic of the area from the end of the 4th c. is
a large terracotta antefix in the form of a Gorgon whose
face—and particularly the treatment of the eyes—is typical of Lucanian art, an awkward imitation of its Greek
prototypes. A bronze candelabra, and several bronze
figurines of Herakles further document this period. The
town ceased to exist about the middle of the 3d c. B.C.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
F. Ranaldi,
Attività archeologica nella
Provincia di Potenza (1960); O. T. Zanco,
PdP 19
(1964) 365-72; D. Adamesteanu,
Atti VI Convegno Taranto (1967) 263-66; id.,
Atti IX Convegno Taranto (1970) 223-26.
D. ADAMESTEANU
