Il progetto ArcheoNevola e la pianificazione di una scoperta: la tomba di un principe Piceno a Corinaldo (Ancona)

In Corinaldo, located in the northern Marche region, an integrated research brought to light a high-status tomb dating back to the 7th century BC, which provides remarkable data on a wide range of aspects of the Picenian culture in this central part of Italy. The discovery is the result of a combination of aerial survey, geophysical prospection and targeted archaeological excava- tion, undertaken by the multidisciplinary ArcheoNevola project, based in the University of Bologna, and carried out in ad- vance of a planned development program. The cooperation with the Marche Archaeological Superintendency and the Mu- nicipality of Corinaldo allowed to start with a preliminary impact assessment, within the designed construction of a new Sport complex in the Nevola River Valley. The excavations carried out in 2017 and 2018, here presented, involving small-scale trials followed by open-area investiga- tion, quickly confirmed and supplemented the results of the non-invasive survey, revealing the remains of an extraordinary funerary deposit related to a princely leader within the early Iron Age society of the region. As the first such monument identified and excavated in northern Marche this has provided an extraordinary opportunity to investigate a type-site of the Picenian culture, up till now poorly documented and little understood despite its undoubted importance in the pre-Roman development of the area. The success of the operation lies both in the value of the finding, which belongs to a rare class of elitarian funerary monu- ment, and in discovery methodology, as part of development-led archaeology. At this stage of the research, still in pro- gress, questions remain about several aspects of the Picene tomb and the ancient funerary landscape, but some prelimi- nary thoughts can be advanced about the amount of data collected, which will be progressively refined when the investiga- tion goes further.