GIS potentialities in reconstructing social structures and economic and settling strategies in Mousterian sites of Central-Southern Italy

The study of Neandertal behaviour in Central-Southern Italy using GIS systems is one the research topics explored by the R.U. of Prehistory and Anthropology (DSFTA) of the University of Siena. Multidisciplinary and integrated analytic protocols have been applied in a number of stratigraphic contexts of Central-Southern Italy: Grotta Grande and Riparo del Molare (MIS 5; San Giovanni a Piro, SA; Ronchitelli et al. 2011, Boscato et al. 2002), Riparo l’Oscurusciuto (MIS 3; Ginosa, TA; Marciani et al. 2016, Spagnolo et al. 2016) and Grotta dei Santi (MIS 3; Monte Argentario, GR; Spagnolo 2017). These sites are particularly suitable for being observed under a multi-scale perspective: from the high-resolution diachronic reading of historical processes to the intra-site investigation at a territorial scale. Settling strategies of Neandertal hunter-gatherers are the pivot around which a lively scientific debate has developed among scholars of different disciplines, highlighting the magnitude of the problem in terms of involved research fields. As a consequence increasingly integrated methodologies of study are needed. Thus, the contextual multi-scale dimension of Spatial Archaeology is becoming the ideal “scenario” where the integration among single results of prehistoric research can occur. According to investigations carried out at an intra-site scale, the different organization of space in Neandertal camps of the examined sample is probably the expression of merely spatial variables (e.g. size of the investigated area), even if, sometimes, it seems to actually mirror real differences in settling strategies (e.g. brief vs. long occupations). As expected, the degree of “archaeological visibility” of the activity areas is directly proportional to how much the contexts under study lasted in time. Consequently, living floors and short-lived palimpsests can be obviously read more clearly than long-lasting palimpsests. Moreover, the availability of stratigraphic sequences with several occupational layers, often very well preserved, is a key-factor for detecting continuity and discontinuity of settlement patterns. Settlement fluctuations and changes, besides representing adaptations to local environmental contexts, work as proxies for social structures and for one of the “quiet motors” of history: dialectic relation between “group memory” and “Longue durée”. On a territorial geographical scale, spatial analyses, integrated by palaeo-environmental evidence and by techno-economic data from lithic assemblages and faunal associations contribute to the reconstruction of mobility strategies and of “play ranges” of hunter-gatherer groups.
Sezione di Museologia Scientifica e Naturalistica, Vol 13 (2017): IV IAPP - Ferrara 2018