Monte Polizzo (today Mount ''Polizo'') is an archaeological site located 6 km northwest of the town of
Salemi
Salemi is a town and ''comune'' in southwestern Sicily, Italy, administratively part of the province of Trapani.
History
Salemi is where Giuseppe Garibaldi announced the annexation of Sicily on May 14, 1860, as part of the Expedition of the T ...
, in the
province of Trapani
Trapani ( it, Provincia di Trapani, scn, Pruvincia di Tràpani; officially ''Libero consorzio comunale di Trapani'') is a province in the autonomous island region of Sicily, southern Italy. Following the suppression of the Sicilian provinces, it ...
, western
Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Ethnicity
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographi ...
, southern
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
. It occupies an easily defended hilltop, from which a vast area of western Sicily can be seen, and consists of an interconnected group of ridges, the highest point of which is 725.9 m (2359 feet) above sea level. The settlement has been dated to c. 9th - 4th centuries BC.
The Monte Polizzo Project is a group of international scholars who are interested in the ancient
Elymians
The Elymians ( grc-gre, Ἔλυμοι, ''Élymoi''; Latin: ''Elymi'') were an ancient tribal people who inhabited the western part of Sicily during the Bronze Age and Classical antiquity.
Origins
According to Hellanicus of Lesbos, the Elymians ...
of western Sicily, and their
Early Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
origins, development and eventual collapse. It also aims to investigate the process of
Hellenisation
Hellenization (other British spelling Hellenisation) or Hellenism is the adoption of Greek culture, religion, language and identity by non-Greeks. In the ancient period, colonization often led to the Hellenization of indigenous peoples; in the ...
and the influence of
Phoenicia
Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their histor ...
n and
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
occupations of western Sicily during the archaic period.
History
![Museo civico di Salemi - Monte Polizo, louche 2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/df/Museo_civico_di_Salemi_-_Monte_Polizo%2C_louche_2.jpg)
In 1970
Vincenzo Tusa launched a campaign of trial excavations in inland western Sicily, including the first organized dig at Monte Polizzo. He opened several trial trenches, uncovering
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
remains, associated with 6th century BC Greek pottery.
In 1996, Vincenzo Tusa's son
Sebastiano (Superintendent of Prehistoric Archaeology for the Trapani province and Professor of Archaeology at the
University of Naples
The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...
) created an international project to further understanding of the Elymians, with Monte Polizzo at its core. In 1998 the Sicilian-Scandinavian Archaeological Project was launched, led by Sebastiano Tusa and
Kristian Kristiansen (Professor of Archaeology at the
Göteborg University
The University of Gothenburg ( sv, Göteborgs universitet) is a university in Sweden's second largest city, Gothenburg. Founded in 1891, the university is the third-oldest of the current Swedish universities and with 37,000 students and 6000 s ...
in
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
).
From 1998 to 2001, Christopher Prescott of the
University of Oslo
The University of Oslo ( no, Universitetet i Oslo; la, Universitas Osloensis) is a public research university located in Oslo, Norway. It is the highest ranked and oldest university in Norway. It is consistently ranked among the top universit ...
directed excavation of House 1, dated c. 550-525 BC, as well as the town dump and areas on the north slope of the acropolis. Excavations were extended to the west in 2002 by Christian Mühlenbock and Kristian Kristiansen from the university of Gothenburg. The new area revealed additional house complexes from the mid 6th century BC. The excavations were drawn to a close in 2006 but the results will soon been published in two major volumes.
Archaeological survey of the surrounding area was undertaken by
Michael Kolb
Michael J. Kolb (born c. 1960) is an American anthropologist. He currently holds the position of Professor of Anthropology at Metropolitan State University of Denver and Presidential Teaching Professor Emeritus at Northern Illinois University, whe ...
of Northern Illinois University beginning in 1998 and revealed a rich settlement system dating from the Copper Age to the medieval period, many of the sites being reoccupied over time. Kolb has also excavated at nearing
Salemi
Salemi is a town and ''comune'' in southwestern Sicily, Italy, administratively part of the province of Trapani.
History
Salemi is where Giuseppe Garibaldi announced the annexation of Sicily on May 14, 1860, as part of the Expedition of the T ...
,
The Lost Settlement of Halikyai
/ref> recovering finds that document the presence of residual 6th century BC activity and 4th–3rd century BC settlement, lending credence to the idea that Salemi is the ancient city of Halyciae
Halyciae (Halykiai, Halykiae) is the ancient name for one of the settlements of the Elymians on the island of Sicily, known as ''Alicia'' in more recent Italian scholarship.
Though its present location is not known precisely, recent excavation ...
of the Elymians
The Elymians ( grc-gre, Ἔλυμοι, ''Élymoi''; Latin: ''Elymi'') were an ancient tribal people who inhabited the western part of Sicily during the Bronze Age and Classical antiquity.
Origins
According to Hellanicus of Lesbos, the Elymians ...
.
In 1999 Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
joined the Monte Polizzo project, where a team of students led by Michael Shanks
Michael Garrett Shanks (born December 15, 1970) is a Canadian actor, writer and director. He is best known for his role as Daniel Jackson in the long-running military science fiction television series ''Stargate SG-1'' and as Charles Harris on ...
and Emma Blake began analyzing finds from the 1998 excavations. In 2000, Professor Ian Morris (Professor of Classics and Professor of History at Stanford University) began excavating on the acropolis
An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens, ...
with students and volunteers from around the world. By 2002 the acropolis excavation had become one of the largest archaeological projects in the western Mediterranean.
Excavations on the acropolis were drawn to a close during the 2006 season, although analysis of the backlog of artifacts continues. Annual preliminary reports in English are published in ''Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome'', and in Italian in ''Sicilia Archaeologica''.
References
Bibliography
*
External links
*http://www.stanford.edu/group/mountpolizzo/historiography.htm
*https://archive.today/20121212192032/http://dig.anthro.niu.edu/sicily/sic_home.htm
Ancient Sicily
Archaeological sites in Sicily
Elymians
Iron Age sites in Europe
{{Sicily-geo-stub