Trebbio (Sansepolcro, AR). An Italic settlement in the borderland between northern Etruria and Umbria

Archaeological excavations conducted by the University of Naples Federico II and the University of Siena in Trebbio di Sansepolcro (Sansepolcro, province of Arezzo) have significantly contributed to the knowledge of an Italic settlement of the 8th-6th century BC located on the left bank of the Tiber River. It is a centralized or proto-urban settlement, in all probability artificially fortified, which is located on flat land. The study of its topographical characteristics and the rich data of its material culture, including many ceramics and metal objects, are starting to offer a new image of a 'frontier' settlement with specific cultural traits, closer to the Middle Adriatic contexts than to the Etruscan ones. Based on these evidences, and through comparisons with other nearby sites, the authors argue that the upper course of the Tiber River between the Late Iron Age and Orientalizing Age/Early Archaism was beginning to play the role of a fluid geographical boundary between different s...