In collaboration with the MIGMAG project, in 2022 the Chair of Greek Archaeology at the University of Vienna launched a project centred upon the Archaic necropolis of Metauros, in southern Tyrrhenian Calabria at the site of present-day Gioia Tauro (RC).

The site of Metauros is in many ways emblematic of the complex dynamics at work in the central Mediterranean during the first centuries of the 1st millennium BCE. The centre was founded in the early 7th century B.C. at the mouth of the Metauros River, in a location naturally devoted to exchange, ideal for controlling the intense maritime traffic running along the Strait of Messina.

Sporadic later sources (Solinos and Stephanos Byzantinos) attribute its founding to the Greeks of Zancle (modern-day Messina) or Lokri Epizephirii. Metauros would not, however, play a prominent role in the later history of the Western Greek poleis: the centre prospered in the seventh century, but already by the second half of the sixth century its importance appears to have declined, while the neighboring poleis of Medma and Hipponion were thriving.

The founding of Metauros thus seems to be an expression of the intense horizon of Mediterranean mobility that saw the birth of the Greek poleis of Calabria, at a stage still substantially prior to the growth of the latter into full-fledged territorial states.

Explored by Claudio Sabbione in the 1970s and 1980s, the Metauros necropolis consists of about 1,600 excavated tombs that are still little known in detail.

The study of this contest will allow an in-depth understanding of the forms of funerary representations adopted by this community; the combination of the archaeological study to the archaeometric and bioarchaeological approaches will also allow the reconstruction of the overall framework of the mobility of people, raw materials and objects.

In the centuries that saw the birth and growth of Metauros numerous other communities flourished in southern Italy and Sicily. The aim of this workshop is the comparison of the funerary behaviours adopted in the Archaic age both in the polis in formation and in the communities of local imprint in Calabria and Sicily, in order to highlight common patterns as well as local specificities and divergences. For this purpose, we have involved a group of scholars active on these research topics. The workshop will foster an informal atmosphere of debate and opinion exchange, open to suggestions and input from the audience. Come join us!

To register, please contact: bettina.bernegger@univie.ac.at