Page 1

The goal of attending the Badia Pozzeveri field school in Altopascio, Italy, offered by The Ohio State Uni-versity, was to get a hands-on educa-tion on medieval bioarchaeology through all-day excavations, intense laboratory sessions, and lectures from the best people in the field. Addition-ally, spending six weeks working in a country with a rich history was a greater education and experience than anything comparable in a class-room back in the United States. The objectives of the excavation was to:

Train students how to properly excavate medieval-period Italian buri-als through proper bioarchaeological field methods.

Understand the site history of the church of San Pietro a Pozzeveri in Altopascio and how it served as a center of worship for the area for hundreds of years.

Provide students with intense, hands-on laboratory experience in material culture, GIS, and osteology that will be valuable for their future work in the field.

Why I chose to go to Badia Pozzeveri Field School There were three main reasons why I chose to attend a field school at Badia Pozzeveri. First of all, this Ohio State-supported bioarchaeology field school came highly recommended to me as a structured, rigorous learning experience that could help me find what I liked and didn’t like about bioarchaeology. Second of all, I was impressed that the field school was co-taught by Clark Larsen, the premier bioarchaeologist focusing on integrating the natural sciences with anthropology worldwide. Lastly, I wanted to see what kind of work in bioarchaeology would be available for me if I chose to specialize in the Mediterranean and what kind of skills I would need to know.

Italian Bioarchaeology and Badia Pozzeveri Bioarchaeology in Italy has always been prosperous thanks to hundreds and thousands of years of Italian history. Most bioar-chaeology at Badia Pozzeveri focuses on the Medieval period (476 C.E-1494 C.E), but habitation by hominins in Italy go back as far as 200,000 years ago. The bioarchaeology from Ancient Rome (753 B.C.E-476 C.E), and Renaissance Era (1330 C.E-1550 C.E), for example, is so rich on the peninsula, it is no wonder why modern Italians are proud of their country’s history and people. The Badia Pozzeveri churchyard, located on a hill next to a vineyard in Altopascio, Tuscany, served as the final resting place for local residents and monks of the now decrepit Abbey of St.

Peter from the 11th to the 19th centuries. First mention of the site, however, dates back to May 7th, 952 C.E. in a deed concerning property transfer. Today, Altopascio is now home to about 15,000 Italians and the town has always had a small population, with tour-ists coming in and out through the pilgrimage pathway, Via Fran-cigena, which crosses through it. Historically, however, the quiet, monastic life of the church came to an end in 1325 C.E when Al-topascio served as the battle ground in the September 23rd battle between the Florentine army and the Luccan army, with an easy win for Lucca. The site also serves as a resting ground to individu-als during the Re-naissance, most of whom are buried in area 3000. However, the final use of the site as a cemetery was during the 1850s, where it served as a mass grave for chol-era victims. Those burials, all of whom are buried in area 2000, were in a disarray, orientated in varying positions as though they were buried in a hurry. None of these cholera burials were excavated this year, but area 2000 still had dozens of 19th century burials that they excavated this year.

The Classroom Aspect of the Field School Students were here to work as well as learn how to think criti-cally. We had assigned readings which were discussed and picked apart in order to comprehend what we were eventually tested on. Additionally, the field school included three labs that were all man-datory for all students to take. These were a material culture lab, an osteology lab, and a GIS lab. GIS, or geographic information sys-tems, describes the world in terms of attributes and locations. For field archaeology, it is crucial to utilize GIS technology because it maintains evidence that will be destroyed/altered in the future and provides a method to manipulate data on a 3-D space. Every stu-dent in this field school was required to take an individualized, two-day session on GIS. They learned how to take points, project them geometrically on AutoCAD, transfer the image into Adobe Photoshop, and then georeferenced the image into the GIS com-puter program, QGIS. Similarly, the human osteology laboratory was an individualized two-day lesson teaching each student how to identify each bone and feature in the skeleton, the types of mechanical and biological processes that alter the bone’s aesthetic, and how to clean bones without damaging them. The material culture laboratory had stu-dents identify and clean pieces of pottery as well as learn about the other types of material goods that have been found at the site (i.e., funeral shroud pins, crosses, glass, coins, buttons, coffin nails, and even a pair of spectacles). Some excavation days were cut short to listen to lectures given by world-famous bioarchaeologists, including Clark Larsen, Sharon

Badia Pozzeveri Field School

MALLORY SCHREIER

AN THROPOLOGY NE W SL ETTE R Page 2

DeWitte, and Gino Fornaciari. We were given two lectures on the paleopathological work Dr. Fornaciari, a professor at the Uni-versity of Pisa, had done on the famous Italian Medici family dynasty. Dr. Larsen gave us three lectures on the principles of bioarchaeology as it relates to health, quality of life, and adaptation and Dr. DeWitt gave us an idea of what paleopathological re-search entails in her work with tracing the origins of the Black Plague. Between lec-tures, lab work, and teaching the students how to properly label and identify human bones, the field school instructors also spent a great deal of additional time with the students; everyone lived together, worked together, and ate together. The field school instructors, some of whom were MA/PhD students themselves, had a seem-ingly inexhaustible knowledge in archaeo-logical stratigraphy, human osteology, and material culture. Their knowledge expanded beyond local Al-topascian history – my instructors were vital resources in my planning process for my weekend trips to Lucca, Cinque Terre, Rome, Pompeii, and Florence.

The Six “Areas” of the Site Before I discuss what my area worked on and make that the focus of this paper, I am going to briefly describe the other areas. First, the churchyard has been divided into six “areas,” each with its own site supervisor guiding five or six students, labeled areas 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000, 5000, and 6000. Areas 1000 and 4000, both containing burials dating to 1039-1400 C.E., were finished excavating last year. Area 2000 (1300-1400 C.E; 1850s) served as an actual, designated cemetery of the church and contains the most bodies out of them all. Area 3000 (1400-1750 C.E.), located right in front of the church, had densely packed, mostly well-preserved, Renaissance-era burials. Area 5000, opened just last year, is hypothesized to have been used as early as the 8th century due to relative dating of material culture, but as there are no buri-als in that section, it is difficult to make sure. Area 6000, which I worked in, was just opened this year (as in the parking lot con-crete was removed), and so far, the few burials and material goods that have been found indicate it was used as far back as the 12th century until the Renaissance. Every day, each group was required to write a journal about their excavation and upload it on the Badia Pozzeveri website, http://paleopatologia.it/home.php (in Italian). The next few paragraphs contain sections of those journal entries written by Area 6000 that I deemed summarized the most important parts of the excavation. Notably, I wrote or at least contributed to writing all the journal entries.

The “Highlights” of Area 6000’s Exca-vation Journal 06/24/15: [The students working in area 6000] worked on clearing out the trench, Area 6002, with shovels and pick-axes. The trench was a 20th century (1910s) fill from a 13th century medieval-period cemetery that cut into Area 6001 and 6003, which are also dated to the Medieval period. While sifting through the dirt, we found nails, bone fragments, and three types of pottery: Maculata (19th-20th century); Maiolica Ar-caica (14th century); and Incobbiata (19th century). Unfortunately, they were all out of context. Tomorrow, we will continue to shovel, pick-axe, and trowel on the trench. 06/26/15: Within the fill [inside the trench], we found bone fragments as well as a funeral shroud pin, a piece of glass, a coin, and small pieces of pottery. Next Monday, the area will be dampened with

water to determine the soil colors along the sections and fully outline bones and other important features. 06/30/15: Most of the work day was spent removing another foot of the trench, shoveling out the rocks used to maintain the now-defunct water channel. After digging through the distal zone of the trench from Area 3000, we uncovered the left leg, the spine, and most of the ribs of an upright skeleton, likely from an adult, located in the layer underneath the cut. [By the end of the field school, this skeleton was exposed but not removed since it was too far down in the stratigraphy.]

07/01/15-07/02/15: We took photographs of specific char-acteristics in our site (i.e. a burial part of the medieval cemetery and a circular rock formation that is most likely the previous en-trance to the basilica). At the end of the day, we started to exca-vate the fill of area 6013, by removing the filled material and un-covering details of the site and its contents for further excava-tion. From the bones that were found in area 6013, we believe that there were possibly two burials. The bones were separated by a dark, stone slab placed between them. We think there are two burials because there is a second large stone that may serve

AN THROPOLOGY NE W SL ETTE R Page 3

as the headstone to the burial site. 07/06/15: In area 6024, we continued to work on uncovering our skeleton (area 6023). Although there was a lot of reduction we were able to uncover the pelvis, both tibias, and both fibulas. We also found the entirety of the right arm. Over the last couple of days we found a lot of glazed pottery that we believe was a cooking pot from the 19th century. [The skeleton was taken out the following day. This first was our first fully excavated skele-ton].

07/14/15: Three circular pits were excavated today, all of which cut into layer 6023. One of the circular pits was around 20cm x 20cm across and located in the northeastern part of 6003 near the edge of the trench. It was covered by 6003 and was like-ly fabricated to serve as a fire pit. Another pit was located in the south western portion of 6003. The cut was -6039, and 6040 was the fill; and at the bottom of the cut was a large oval rock, indi-cating the end of the pit. The third pit was also in the southwest-ern part of 6003, near a large -6029. It was likely created to serve as a posthole for a column. 07/17/15: Today in area 6000, multiple projects were simulta-neously finished and continued. We found the cut of a pit (-6045) and cleaned out all fill (6044), finding pottery, bricks, and a huge stone believed to be taken from a wall. We believe this pit was once a posthole pit cut into area 6006. Another project that took place in 6006 was the uncovering and exposure of a lithic tomb (6047) [No skeletons were found, which ended up being a com-mon occurrence in our area]. 07/22/15-07/24/15: Today [and the rest of the week], we worked on three areas: 6052, the lithic tomb; area 6051, a skull depository; and area 6053, a primary burial with intense wall ef-fect [see the attached pictures of the burial with and without re-duction]. First, we finished removing the skull from the burial in area 6051. The next step was to expose the second cranium that was found lying underneath. While exposing it, three other crania were found along the walls of the lithic tomb. We then deter-mined it was a reduction burial, where other bones were moved into the primary burial. We finished uncovering the main reduc-tion cranium, and plan on removing this, along with the other three crania tomorrow. We also continued to expose burial 6053 so that we can remove all of the bones on Friday for pictures.

[Then on the following day], the main objective today was to remove rocks that were penetrated within the burial, remove bones that are part of the reduction (area 6050), and to remove layers of dirt. As we removed more dirt from the cranium, we found numerous additional bones that are connected to the buri-al 6053. Furthermore, most of the ribs, spinal column, and pelvis were exposed today. [Burial 6053, which I exclusively worked on, was not finished until the following Monday due to the condition of the skeleton and the amount of reduction scattered around the burial.] Another member of the group continued to work on area 6052. The member started exposing the bones and leveling out the tomb. Area 6052 is believed to be a structured burial, due to the fact that there are multiple long bones possibly belonging to different individuals. Tomorrow, the same work will be contin-ued on the tomb. 07/27/15: Burial 6053 was taken out, photographed, and GIS points were taken. The burial, an individual aged 30-40 years of age, was deemed to have suffered from a number of conditions: wall effect, osteoarthritis in the spine, and enamel hypoplasia. 07/29/15: We started troweling and leveling area 6032, the final area of the field school season. While leveling this area, we found a large slab stone, which may possibly be the headstone of a burial. Along with this, multiple crania and mandibles were found, as well as a skull. These were carefully photographed, had their points taken, and removed just in time for the end of the field season. Conclusion or Final Words about the Field School Human life history is not black or white; no one has a quality of life that is 0% or 100%. I’ve come to learn during this past year in graduate school how many different factors play into health, lifestyle, and the human condition and most importantly, why I actually care. The Badia Pozzeveri field school, a project intended to give students a hands-on crash course into the world of medieval bioarchaeology, made me feel like I was making a difference. I felt like every scrape of my bone tool along centuries-old bone or pottery was like I was personally uncovering a small part of history.