How Diverse Was Ischia's 8th-Century B.C. Community?

ISCHIA, ITALY—According to a statement released by the Sapienza University of Rome, an international team of scholars has highlighted the fundamental role that the island of Ischia played in cultural interactions during the early Iron Age. Greeks from the island of Euboea sailed into the Bay of Naples in the eighth century b.c. and established on Ischia the colony of Pithekoussai, the first Greek settlement in the western Mediterranean Sea. The outpost soon became a thriving melting pot of various cultural groups. Researchers conducted strontium isotope analysis on the teeth and bones of 50 individuals who were buried at the Pithekoussai necropolis during the early first millennium b.c. to help determine their geographic origins. The study revealed that the island was actually home to a diverse community consisting of Greeks, Phoenicians, and Italians. In contrast to previous expectations, the research also suggested that it was not just male traders and merchants who traveled from distant places to settle and live on Ischia. Women were also an integral part of the migratory process. “The integration of archaeological, anthropological and biogeochemical data allowed us to reconstruct the movements and interactions between the peoples who populated the island of Ischia with a level of detail never reached before and confirming the image of a Mediterranean of dialogue and mobility during the first millennium b.c.,” said Carmen Esposito of the University of Bologna. Read the original scholarly article about this research in iScience. To read about a famous artifact from Pithekoussai, go to "Who Drank From Nestor's Cup?"