Oenotria: history and territory

by Simeone Andrulli

With the term Oenotria the ancient sources indicate the vast territory between the Metaponto-Posidonia axis (from the mouth of the Bradano to the mouth of the Sele) and the current Calabrian region.
Even with a basic cultural homogeneity in Oenotria, regional realities deriving from geographical and ecological specificities can be distinguished, in particular from those relating to the resources of the territories. Even in the Oenotria area of present-day Basilicata, more cantonal realities can be distinguished, corresponding to the coastal and internal area or to the different river basins. The coast, comprising the fertile Ionic alluvial plain and the Pleistocene terraces behind it, lent itself to a mixed agricultural and livestock economy up to the first hills beyond the S. Maria d'Anglona, Pisticci, Craco, Ferrandina line, where it was a series of settlements located in an elevated position for the control of the territory and of the coastal itineraries or directed towards the interior, just according to the settlement model of the Oenotrians indicated by Dionysius of Halicarnassus. It is possible, as in the case of S. Maria d'Anglona or Incoronata di Metaponto, that already from the eighth century B.C. were in place of the forms of settlement hierarchy identifiable in some of the inhabited known by the two localities, probably due to external dynamics and socio-economic transformations of coastal realities. The two localities with settlements located on the surrounding terraces have vast economic spaces open towards the Ionian plain. Santa Maria d'Anglona, moreover, is characterized as a natural acropolis for the strong position of control towards the sea and the low valleys of Agri and Sinni, which Strabo describes as navigable, perhaps in their terminal stretch.

This coastal horizon finds its own specificity in the ritual of Adriatic-Balkan influence of the curled deposition of the deceased, accompanied by the use of stone mounds or the covering of pits with stone material, which appears to be spread from the Murgia materana to the coastal area along the line Anglona, Craco, Pisticci, Ferrandina also encompassing the town of Serra di Vaglio. The ritual, for the coastal area, represents almost an ethnic identity, in which you can recognize the Chones of the literary tradition of Siritide, Metapontino and the Calabrian coast from Sibari to Crotone.
The internal area of Agri-Sinni, characterized by hills and a mountainous interior landscape, in ancient certainly covered by woods, had to have economic potential in forestry-pastoral but also agricultural with arable fields, in particular in some vast parapluvial niches such as those of the basins of S. Arcangelo or Senise.
Also here since the ninth century B.C. there are settlements located on the top of reliefs such as Noepoli and Chiaromonte, which spread during the following century to Guardia Perticara, Garaguso or Serra di Vaglio. Open areas of the valley floor are also occupied, such as S. Brancato di S. Arcangelo, a sign of the importance of the itinerary of the Agri valley. The valley of the Sinni was also an important way of communication, as attested by the bronze vases or the sword of the Tyrrhenian type imported from Chiaromonte. It is possible that also this center has known of the forms of hierarchy of the inhabited ones seen the presence of more cemetery nuclei of IX-VIII century corresponding to as many tribal realities. The internal areas of the Agri-Sinni are characterized by the burial ritual supine Tyrrhenian gravitation attested by medium valleys (Sant'Arcangelo, Noepoli, Aliano) to the inside (Chiaromonte, Guardia Pertìcara).
All the Oenotrio-Italic world of the early Iron Age (IX-VIII century BC) appears formed by small settlements of huts with social organization of tribal type, based on simple parentelar relationships. They are, in general, of modest entity and only in coastal area are recognizable, as has been said, forms of structuring of the inhabited and economic spaces.
However, the coastal and internal settlements located along the main routes since the ninth century are presented as socio-economic entities in the process of organization, as indicated by the relevant characters or families highlighted by rich funeral goods, male or female, thanks to which it is possible to recognize forms of distinction in the social scale based not only on the role but also on the rank. It is above all the subconscious realities of Anglona and Incoronata that seem to develop in the eighth century B.C. forms of space organization, with phenomena of local synecism that exceed the structure of the traditional clan, probably as a result of experiences and contacts with the first proto-colonial commercial realities present in the coastal area. Signs of development are also to be found in Chiaromonte, where they were possible thrusts coming from the advanced Tyrrhenian world. Indeed, it is possible that the different Italic realities of the 9th-8th centuries have been in mutual contact and have been influenced by the Ionian and Tyrrhenian areas thanks to the itineraries represented by the Sinni-Noce or Lao axes to the south and Agri-Tanagro-Sele axes to the north. Even the northern Oenotria from Incoronata to Ferrandina to Garaguso and Guardia Perticara or Vaglio seems to have been favored by the role offered by the Basento valley. Naturally a more marked and incisive circulation of goods and ideas along the river axes is affirmed only from the beginning of the VII century B.C., when the foundation of the Greek colonies (Siris, Sibari, Metaponto) on the Ionian and the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Etruscan centers in the inner Campania cause the Oenotrians to establish intense contacts with those great cultural realities. The possibility of fostering stable trade relations between the Greek-Ionic world and the Etruscan-Tyrrhenian world allow the wine-producing centres between Basento and Sinni a significant leap in quality as socio-economic growth and consequent demographic development of both the existing settlements, both as the birth of other important centers (Latronico, S.Costantino Albanese, Fardella, Roccanova, Senise, Aliano, Alianello, Armento etc.).
The presence of pre-protocolonial time in the coastal area since the end of the VIII century B.C. and above all the foundation of the colonies determine an irreversible crisis of the sub-continental indigenous world that begins to gravitate into the Greek orbit. In S. Maria d'Anglona a rapid process of deconstruction of the indigenous communities began and the few funerary goods of the early seventh century are now composed of Greek type vases. The same phenomenon is felt in Kornati with the end of the indigenous settlements and the development of the emporial reality of the Greek Kornati, which precedes the foundation of Metaponto. In both cases the Hellenic presence entails for these Italic sites the almost total loss of the ancient cultural identity and the adaptation to new models imposed by the colonial reality.
On the contrary, the opening of trade flows from the Ionian to the Etruscan-Tyrrhenian areas determines a great development of the internal Oenotria with the consequent start of a process of Hellenization of the Italic communities within which "aristocratic" families assert themselvesadopting new customs and behaving according to the models of social prestige introduced by Greek culture, as shown by the changes in the funeral ritual and the compositional system of the trousseaux or the massive circulation of valuable goods from the Greek or Etruscan-Tyrrhenian world.

The decadence of Siris (mid-6th century BC) by the Greek-Achaean coalition founded by the powerful Sibari and the more incisive and organic predominance of the latter with the creation of the "Sibarite empire" in the internal Oenotrian area, based on the control of "four peoples and twenty-five cities", as reported by Strabo (VI. 1, 13), produce a further positive effect on these populations, which know a stronger development until the middle of the fifth century B.C. This development is marked by a further process of acculturation, based on Greek and Etruscan models, which also covers the religious sphere, as demonstrated by many funeral kits from Chiaromonte, Alianello or Guardia Perticara.
The modalities of the political insertion of Sibari in the Oenotrian world can be guessed on the basis of the treaty of friendship of the Serdaioi attested by the famous bronze table of Olympia and certainly referred to indigenous peoples through which the trades sibarites directed towards the Tyrrhenian Sea. And the interests of Sìbari in those areas had to be of considerable complexity to implement a differentiated policy of economic control attested by the different monetary issues "empire" intended for the different Italian realities between the Agri-Sinni and the Tyrrhenian, including coins with legend Serd.
Towards the middle of the fifth century on the Oenotrian world, now in crisis following the collapse of Sibari (510 BC) and after a short period of Metapontine influence, new ethnic realities (groups of Osco-Samnites lineage) appeared, which will lead briefly and through complex dynamics to the emergence of the ethnos of the Lucanians

Identification of the Oenotrians

Archaeological Park of Paludi

The archaeological park is placed on a plateau located at the top of a hill oriented towards NE- SO, about 2 km from the center of Paludi and 8 km away from the sea. The site has a attendance of protohistoric age relative to an important wine center of which are evidence of ceramics, weapons and ornaments.
An attendance of Greek age is testified by the presence of a building covered by ceramics of the VI-IV sec. a.c.
The fortified settlement was built in the Hellenistic period around the middle of the century. IV B.C. by the Italic people of the Bruttian people through a defense system with towers with a circular plan, walls in blocks of local sandstone and a door to the east of the "courtyard" type with two circular towers.
The castrum also contained civil, religious, public (assembly theatre) buildings and production facilities.
Restoration and enhancement activities are underway by the Municipality of Paludi and the Superintendence within the POR Calabria.

Museum of the Bruttians and Oenotrians - Cosenza

The Museum of the Bruttians and Oenotrians is above all a permanent archaeological exhibition, but also a cultural center that hosts temporary exhibitions, concerts and institutional meetings. Here, in a combination of archeology, art and digital teaching tools, visitors can experience culture in an innovative and pleasant way. Everything, from the graphics of the educational panels to the lighting of the rooms, is taken care of in order to create an attractive but also welcoming atmosphere, in which mainly the archeology of Calabria, markedly that of the Cosentino, is available to those who want to discover the ancient origins of Lucania and Calabria.