Museo Nazionale Della Magna Grecia - Collections - Prehistory and Protohistory

Prehistory and Protohistory

This section, which was recently reorganized with modern didactical criteria and with the construction of various rooms, collects Calabrian materials of sure date and origin, prehistoric findings (which come from stratified excavations) presented in chronological order through the documentation from the different sites, and displayed in the long room dedicated to them.

The most antique objects, coming from the Lower Paleolithic date back to 600,000 years ago, are “choppers” (splintered rocks), found near Casella di Maida in the center of Calabria.

At the entrance of the room are two large dioramas with life scenes from the people of the Middle and Upper Paleolithic. Next, there is the reproduction of the engraving representing the Bos Primigenius a bovid dating back around 11,000 years ago (thus from the final part of the Upper Paleolithic). It was discovered on a boulder in 1961, together with two other smaller figures and many linear signs, at the Riparo del Romito in the municipality of Papasidero, along the river valley Lao, which is at the border with Basilicata. The reproduction of the engraving has a great artistic value (beside its historical value) because the assurance of the line and the tridimensional effect make it the most significant figure, among all those found in the Mediterranean Sea, of the Paleolithic realism.

Next to the engraving, simulating what was found at the Romito, a tomb has been recreated, in which one can see the skeletons of two people who have been buried contemporaneously in an unusual position, laying side by side and partially overlapping. The female skeleton laying underneath slips her left arm, as if in an affectionate gesture, around the neck of the young man partially above her who, as it is visible, is deformed by rickets. Maybe these are the skeletons of the guardians, pro tempore, of this sacred place, which has bovine engravings that are the images used during the rites before the hunt.

Continuing further we find another diorama constructed to show scenes of life of the Neolithic (8,000- 5,000 years ago), followed by some show windows exhibiting terracotta, bronze, and iron objects, such as: vases, pitchers, calices, ax, swords and fibula, which go from the Neolithic to the next ages, coming from Calabrian places such as: Praia a Mare, Torre Galli, Santa Domenica di Ricadi, Roccella Ionica, Amendolara, Cassano allo Ionio.