Handicraft (Early Iron Age), chapter 40

This chapter illustrates the main fields of craft production in the area characterized by the Villanovan culture (Etruria and adjacent areas) from the points of view of typological and technological developments. The sociopolitical and economic framework is that of incipient or embryonic urbanization, the “proto-urban phenomenon,” that occurred between the late tenth and late eighth centuries BCE. Ceramics include handmade vessels (chiefly biconical funerary urns and their lids) ornamented with geometric patterns in the Villanovan style, as well as more specialized vessels decorated with metal stripes. Only in the advanced Early Iron Age 2 (eighth century) were wheel-made ceramics introduced under the influence of immigrant Greek potters. The best-known handicraft in Iron Age Etruria is bronze working, a productive field that encompasses a broad range of artifact classes and shapes. Indirect evidence from the study of artifacts attests to specific stages in the metalworking process, demonstrating a high level of specialization and complexity in the organization of labor. The great variability of formal features and techniques, and the different levels of elaboration in Villanovan bronze production are exemplified by cast objects, such as fibulae and weapons (swords), and by hammered items such as sheet bronze armor and vessels. Sheet bronze production is considered particularly representative of the high level of Villanovan craftsmanship and of the close connection between metalwork and the display expressions of new elites within the proto-urban communities. It is also pointed out how iron production, though giving the name to the period, did not become especially important in local economies before the mid eighth century. Other minor materials, especially amber, gained great importance in the framework of elite consumption and trade, which led to a highly sophisticated production of ornaments and symbolic items in the latest stages of this period.