Considerazioni sulla fondazione di Medma alla luce dei più recenti dati archeologici

Maria Rosaria Luberto

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Abstract

Recent excavations conducted in the area of the ‘Campo Sportivo’ in Rosarno, the ancient city of Medma, have returned a group of interesting potsherds mostly dated to the first and second half of the 7th century B.C. They have been presented at the 50th Convegno di Studi sulla Magna Grecia di Taranto by M. T. Iannelli as linked to the foundation of the colony by the motherland Lokroi Epizephyrioi that, as is known, has founded together Medma and Hipponion with the aim of create some outposts on the Tyrrhenian coast. But, while all the historical sources testify that the two cities were founded by Locri, no one of them talks about a contemporaneous birth of these two centres. Furthermore, the early chronology attested by the finds from Rosarno rouses some problems in comparison to the date of foundation of Locri itself. In the present paper the finds have been therefore examined taking on account these problems: they have been reclassified and interpreted in the light of the complex situation of a wider context, that of the Gioia Tauro coastal Plain with the settlement of Metauros, established by Zancle, and the commercial networks of the so called ‘sistema Stretto’.