La ceramica Serra d'Alto in Puglia centro-meridionale tra aspetti simbolici e funzionali

Serra d'Alto ware, characterized by homogeneous and recurrent features, is widespread in southern Italy during the fifth millennium BC and it is well-documented especially in Central South Apulia, an area currently regarded as one of the likely original centers of this material culture. This ceramic class usually consists of fine depurated pottery (figulina) and is decorated with dark brown painted complex geometrical motifs and with plastic appendices serving as handles adornment. Its frequent occurrence in ritual and/or funerary contexts has led many scholars to assume that Serra d'Alto ware constituted a high value products class most probably intended for exchange, an assumption actually refuted thanks to the latest archaeometric characterization projects. However, archaeological investigations recently conducted in Bari’s southeastern area have identified an open-air neolithic settlement with domestic evidences assigned to Serra d'Alto horizon. This has led to raise new questions about the cultural value of this kind of ceramic products and to carry out new studies with the aim of examining all the ceramic materials discovered in contemporary contexts of different kinds, stratigraphically well-documented and located in the Murge area. The analysis of ceramic paste, by the use of archaeometric methods, and the study of vessel shapes and decorative motifs have allowed to better characterize the "domestic" production too and to postulate social fields of production. At the same time, the shards’ contextualization and their distribution within archaeological deposits, given the correlation between ceramic products and particular structures and/or spaces, have led to speculate about the functional and/or symbolic aspects underlying them.