La terramara di Ognissanti (comune di Cella Dati, CR)

The terramara Ognissanti, also known in the literature under the name of Pieve S. Giacomo, was the subject of a report by Antonio Taramelli in Notizie degli Scavi of 1892. Aside from occasional quotations, it was not until 1959 to see published 73 bronze objects by H. Müller-Karpe in his famous work on the chronology of the Urnfield age. Most of these objects will then be published in the PBF volumes dedicated to swords, daggers, knives, razors, and pins, but pottery has remained unpublished until today. Thanks to two dissertations discussed at Milan University, it was possible to classify all the material kept in the Pigorini Museum and at the Archaeological Superintendence of Lombardy.

Elettra Miglioli has discovered an unpublished manuscript on the Ognissanti Terramara by don Gioachino Bonvicini, parish priest of Ognissanti, and the author of two other manuscripts concerning the terramara currently unavailable since removed in unknown time from the Library of the Episcopal Seminary of Cremona. Don Bonvicini was attentive witness of all researches carried out at Ognissanti, and his paper sheds light on the exact location of the settlement, on the researches carried out on the site between 1892 and 1895, on the discovered materials and the relationship between the family Soldi, who managed the farm, and Luigi Pigorini. The Bronze Age settlement was located 350 m south of Ognissanti in the municipality of Cella Dati.

The name of Pieve San Giacomo comes from the fact that Ognissanti is part of the municipality of Pieve San Giacomo but it must be dismissed, while it can keep the Ognissanti name after the group of houses and farms nearest to the archaeological site. Locally, the area was called “Campo Dosso”, because it was at a height of 2 m above the surrounding countryside. Its size was 200 x 160 m, approximately rectangular and NW-SE oriented. Currently the mound disappeared and the field is all levelled. The agricultural works had brought to the ground surface many potsherds and bronze objects and the news came to the attention of Dr. Giacomo Locatelli, who on February 25, 1892 dug three trenches. On November 17 Locatelli opened new trenches with don Ruzzenenti, while the next day joined even Taramelli, who by opening two trenches along the eastern side of the mound discovered the embankment and could determine the orientation of the east side, declining westward to 10 degrees.

In 1893 new excavations were opened with the discovery of many bronze objects and Taramelli tried to locate the cemetery, without success. On April 4, 1895 Locatelli and Ruzzenenti led new excavations. The materials discovered were given to the Pigorini museum by the family Soldi through Taramelli and especially Locatelli. Some dagger blades, a pin and an enigmatic tablet are kept in the Parazzi Museum of Viadana. In the early 80s of the twentieth Century the Pescarolo Archaeological Group carried out a surface research in the area of the Bronze Age settlement, collecting more than 5000 artifacts, including potsherds, faunal remains, stone artifacts and flint. Be noted that the materials were also collected in the field “Pra' Vecc”, adjacent to the mound “Campo Dosso”, but unfortunately the materials were not recorded taking into account of the different collection points.

The most valuable contribution of the ms by don Bonvicini are 23 large-format drawings of 292 finds, of which 113 bronze objects in scale 1: 1, the other including pottery, spindle-whorls, weights, bone-horn and stone artefacts. Among the 113 bronze objects there are 55 daggers, more than those published by Müller-Karpe (1959) and by V. Bianco Peroni (1994). The razors are four, two of which correspond to nos. 6 and 23 of Bianco Peroni (1979); the n. 22 does not appear in Bonvicini's drawings because it reached the Pigorini museum after 1908, while another razor is not present in the collections of Rome.

Finally, one fourth razor matches to measures and “hallmarks” of a specimen inventoried in Pigorini museum as coming from Castellaro of Gottolengo (Bianco Peroni 1979, n. 1), along with a lot of materials given by Locatelli. Giacomo Locatelli (1849-1935) between 1889 and 1922 played an important control work of a large territory between Cremona and Mantua, reporting the discovery of many Bronze Age sites, and acted as a purveyor of a great deal of materials for the museum founded by L. Pigorini. Accumulating so many materials in his villa in Fontanella, he evidently run into some confusion, by sending, eg., a razor from Ognissanti as coming from Castellaro of Gottolengo. We have detected the error due to ms by don Bonvicini, but we wonder whether such cases could have occurred repeatedly, which casts a shadow of doubt on the materials given by Locatelli to the Pigorini museum.

Among 114 ceramics of the Pigorini museum collection and more than 400 from surface collections, a hundred pieces have a precise chronological value. The chronological horizons range from EBA 2 to RBA 1, perhaps with some break in continuity. The EBA 2 ceramics are plentiful both in the Pigorini and in the surface collections, but the only EBA metal object is a flanged axe in low tin bronze, which would seem more ancient than the EBA 2. Among the Pigorini museum materials are lacking MBA 1 ceramics, which on the contrary are well represented in surface collections, while MBA 1 bronze artifacts are not known. The MBA 2 A seems absent, only a few raised handle could be assigned to MBA 2 B. Some of the dagger blades can be dated to MBA 2. Most bronze objects belong to the MBA 3 and RBA 1, chronological phases also very well documented from ceramics.

Three combs made of antler date to MBA 3. In conclusion, the site was active in EBA 2 and MBA 1, then it seems to have been abandoned for nearly a century. It will again be reoccupied by the end of MBA 2 B or early MBA 3 and will experience a period of great flowering throughout the MBA 3 and RBA 1 judging by the bronze artifacts. With the transition from RBA 1 to RBA 2 it will be permanently abandoned. The pin type Ala, the extended winged axe type Goluzzo and the broken winged axe, all types dating to the FBA, do not appear in the drawings by don Bonvicini and their provenance from Ognissanti could be considered doubtful. [Publisher's text]