Baales 2022 – Die letzten Rentierjäger: Stielspitze der Ahrensburger Kultur weit im Süden – AiD (original) (raw)
Germaina, 2019
sequence is documented thanks to the recovery of several surface finds and the excavation of test trenches. They show that the area was settled from the early Bronze Age Polada Culture (Bz A1b) to the 17 th-19 th century AD. Among others, the contribution by G. Bombonato (pp. 723-759) is also to be mentioned. It reports the results of the investigations carried out at the ruins of St Peter's church in locality Castelvecchio / Altenburg near Caldaro. The excavations of the church revealed indeed the existence of one of the most ancient cult places of the entire region. The fact that this location might have been settled in antiquity had already been suggested according to its toponym, which recalls the presence of an "ancient castle". It was in the late 1900s that the restauration of the ruins started, involving also archaeological explorations of the site. These investigations permitted to ascertain not only the existence of a palaeo-Christian phase of the building, but also of an Iron Age layer attributable to the 9 th-7 th century BC. To sum up, this volume is a commendable careful reconstruction of the history of this region that exploits archaeological sources and archive documents, past and present finds, combining the results obtained from new excavations with the study of old collections. It is a complete synthesis of our knowledge on this Alpine region with a more comprehensive bibliography. The volume is nicely illustrated with excellent quality colour and black and white drawings and photographs. However, although many detailed micro-regional maps are provided in the different chapters, a general, large-scale map with the main localities of Trentino / Alto Adige within the surrounding regions (Austria, the Veneto, Friuli and Überetsch / Oltradige within South Tyrol and Italy for instance) is unfortunately missing. Thus, the location of most of the sites presented in the different contributions is difficult to interpret to a reader who is unfamiliar with the area. In my opinion, this is the main fault of the volume that nevertheless represents an important and useful contribution to the knowledge of the archaeology of South Tyrol and the Alpine region in general. Literally, its heavy weight mirrors very well the "weight of knowledge".