CAMPAIGN OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXCAVATIONS OF CUMA (25 June – 20 July 2018)

CAMPAIGN OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXCAVATIONS OF CUMA (25 June – 20 July 2018)

From the end of June to the first part of July 2018 I had the great pleasure of taking part in the excavation campaign conducted in Cuma by the “Luigi Vanvitelli” University of Archeology of Santa Maria Capua Vetere (Caserta, Italy).

The Archaeological Park of Cuma is divided into the so-called “lower city” (the real and original ancient city, first Greek and then Roman) and the “Acropolis”, location of the main sanctuaries, one of which is the so-called Temple of Jupiter. And this ancient Greek sanctuary has been the object of prolific archaeological excavations conducted by the aforementioned University. But why is Cuma so important?

IMPORTANCE OF CUMA:

From the island of Pithecusa (Ischia) the Greeks landed on the mainland to stabilize the most ancient polis (town) of the West during the first half of the 8th century. B.C. [All of this] would bring us the alphabet, philosophy, political and legal institutions. (1)

The transmission of the use of writing and the Chalcedon alphabet, used since the eighth century BC in Rome (vase of the necropolis of Osteria dell’Osa di Gabii of the first half of the eighth century BC) and in Etruria (end of the VIII century BC) to write the first, very short written texts, makes the importance of  its role between the Greek world and the indigenous Tyrrhenian world, Pithecusa and Cuma explicit in the first decades of their lives. (2)

This is why the excavations we carried out with the ‘Luigi Vanvitelli’ University of Archeology in Santa Maria Capua Vetere (Caserta) are of such keen interest.

                                                                   WHAT WE HAVE DISCOVERED:

The excavations, conducted by Professor Carlo Rescigno of the “Luigi Vanvitelli” University of Archeology of Santa Maria Capua Vetere (Caserta), have identified in Apollo the tutelary deity of the Upper Temple of the Acropolis of Cumae, subverting the traditional interpretation which called it the Temple to Jupiter. All this has been possible thanks to numerous findings referring to the Apollonian cult, among which the exceptional discovery of a bronze statuette of the Sybil of Cuma, priestess of Apollo, dating back to the 6th century BC. In other words, most likely, these prolific archaeological excavations have confirmed that the temple at the top of the Cumaean acropolis, likely the most important, was dedicated to Apollo.

Bibliography:

1) Pier Giovanni Guzzo “Pompei, Magna Grecia” pag 56 – da “Pompei e I Greci” a cura di Massimo Osanna e Carlo Rescigno – Electa 2017

2) Gioacchino Francesco La Torre – “Sicilia e Magna Grecia”  – Editori Laterza 2015 pag. 33