1600? The rise of the terramara system (Northern Italy)

After the end of the local Early Bronze Age, central-eastern northern Italy saw the rapid expansion, steep growth and sudden fall of the so-called Terramara settlement model, and the development of a specific archaeological facies. Some of the aspects of the settlement package (raised floor huts, thickly built enclosed settlements, water management facilities) and the basic material culture traits are rooted in the preceding and surrounding traditions. It has been proposed that the quick spread of the new package took the form of a pioneer settling, deeply affecting the landscape. All these aspects can be taken as part of a major socio-economic restructuring, affecting northern Italy, the Apennines, and possibly some wider areas; a Danubian contribution to the process has been considered, without conclusive evidence. The timing of this process has been harshly debated between scholars calling for a higher or lower chronology, locating the transition from northern Italian Early Bronze Age to Middle Bronze Age between 17oo and 16oo cal. B. C.; presently, the positions are slightly converging. This discussion is related to the Thera debate, as cross-dating locates the transition from Middle Helladic to Late Helladic to around the start of southern Italian Middle Bronze Age. Anyhow, a relationship between the disruption caused by the Theran event and Italian transformations has never been called for, and such a dimension could eventually be identified only on a wider European scale.