Una proposta di analisi GIS per la lettura degli assetti insediativi nell'Abruzzo interno tra l'età del Ferro e la romanizzazione

This paper presents a territorial analysis focused on a sample area in the inner region of Abruzzo, delimited by the Gran Sasso and the Sirente mountain ranges and characterised by strong geomorphological irregularities. Archaeological data from the Final Bronze Age/ Early Iron Age to the beginning of the Romanization process are analysed through a computer-based approach, using CAD, DBMS and GIS. Published data about this region are quite disjointed, both for methodological reasons and for various interferences in the archaeological record. These aspects influenced the landscape analyses proposed in previous studies and the hypothesis about the territorial exploitation patterns during the pre-Roman times. Research has been mainly concentrated on sites with better visibility, such as fortified hilltop sites and necropolises, frequently compared to the Roman settlement pattern, based on valley floor sites along the main pathways. Nevertheless, recent surveys suggest that these data should be reconsidered, taking into account both the presence of other kinds of sites (such as the Iron Age/Archaic period small rural sites localised in the valley floor) and continuity in the settlement pattern up to Roman times. The available archaeological data have been processed within a GIS, in order to investigate placement and visibility/intervisibility factors in hilltop fortified sites, starting from an expressly projected DEM. The territorial sample has been filtered using qualitative and quantitative parameters, proving that hilltop sites during the pre-Roman times were likely to control the natural catchment area. In Roman times, this pattern lost its mainly defensive character, with hilltop sites being abandoned, and was incorporated in the so called ‘paganus-vicanicus’ system, connected to the administrative subdivision gravitating on urban centres (coloniae and then municipia) and on new monumental cult places.