<< Our Photo Pages >> Cava Lazzaro - Burial Chamber or Dolmen in Italy in Sicily (Sicilia)
Submitted by Salvatore on Sunday, 05 December 2010 Page Views: 5074
Neolithic and Bronze AgeSite Name: Cava LazzaroCountry: Italy Region: Sicily (Sicilia) Type: Burial Chamber or Dolmen
Nearest Town: Rosolini Nearest Village: Rosolini
Latitude: 36.875230N Longitude: 14.900210E
Condition:
| 5 | Perfect |
| 4 | Almost Perfect |
| 3 | Reasonable but with some damage |
| 2 | Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site |
| 1 | Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks |
| 0 | No data. |
| -1 | Completely destroyed |
| 5 | Superb |
| 4 | Good |
| 3 | Ordinary |
| 2 | Not Good |
| 1 | Awful |
| 0 | No data. |
| 5 | Can be driven to, probably with disabled access |
| 4 | Short walk on a footpath |
| 3 | Requiring a bit more of a walk |
| 2 | A long walk |
| 1 | In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find |
| 0 | No data. |
| 5 | co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates |
| 4 | co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map |
| 3 | co-ordinates scaled from a bad map |
| 2 | co-ordinates of the nearest village |
| 1 | co-ordinates of the nearest town |
| 0 | no data |
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Going down the right slope of the Cava, via the short and steep natural terraces, the rocky walls seem to be pitted with small artificial grotto tombs, oven tombs, vault tombs with a hallway chamber, all of which dating back to the Castelluccian facies [Ref 20]. Ever since the second half of the 1800s, the area has revealed a considerable amount of prehistoric evidence. Ferdinand von Andrian-Werburg, the German anthropologist, is to be thanked for the explorations he led. In one of the many inside caverns, he found various artefacts in stone, some ceramic fragments dating back to the early Bronze Age and lots of bone remains, both human and those of different types of animal [21]. Great surprise arose from the finding of a human frontal, the curve of which was similar in form to the Neanderthal skull, along with an axe in lava material [22], similar to those come across in faraway Ireland [23].
The famous “Prince’s Tomb” is on the same terrace, dug into the chalky rock. It has a monumental façade of eight false semi-columns with a double herringbone pattern, circular [24] and triangular embossment incisions [25]. It was from the Grotta Lazzaro [26], previously investigated by von Andrian, one of the enigmatic globuled bones [27] came. Tusa suggests these could have been knife handles [28]. I went to this impressive place intrigued by the few lines recorded in the book of a scholar from Syracuse who alleged the presence of a “megalithic monument”. Furthermore, the indications were illustrated with a poor photograph [29]. The presumed dolmen, rising just to the west of the Prince’s Tomb, there and then leaves you somewhat perplexed, though showing glimpses of ruins of enormous stone buildings that had rolled along the slopes of the hill and massed together in the same point. In fact, pushing my way some few hundred metres west of the “pile-up”, pointed out by Bongiorno, I localised two vertical columns that would have been the central part of a structure similar to the one of Cava dei Servi.
Here, instead of slabs, two large blocks of grey-white limestone from the area had been used and placed in such a way to sculpt a semi-circular form to the construction. The surviving boulders, drafted using a club, rest on the chalky ground, typical of the area. The existence of hard sub-strata obliged the use of wide-based blocks, upheld by the different levels of the terrain. In fact, the back of both stones is only visible for a quarter of their height: a well-proven method, as we have already seen, which made it easier to cover the whole structure with earth and mud. The difference in thickness noted in one of the monoliths has been caused by atmospheric conditions which affect that side rather than the other.
The mastery of man is to be commended if you notice the conformation at the base of the left block. Our ancestors were able to solve the difference by inserting two wedge stones that were well-modelled to fit the purpose of keeping the defective element upright. An oblique groove runs along the surfaces of both boulders (you can only just see the aforementioned incision on the right block as it is less well-preserved than the other). This ridge, which was probably also on those stones that have been lost, makes us think that there were other slabs that had been systematically positioned obliquely to reduce the cap of the surface, in order to create a false dome. The size of the cell is quite difficult to define though following a hypothetical curvature we could conclude an area of about 4.00sq ms.
Fragments of what may have been a funereal construction are still in a circle. A very large rounded stone on the left of the two vertical ones will have been part of the roof.
The ruins were discovered again some years after my investigative visit by the architect Giuseppe Libra [30], an archaeology enthusiast. He reached similar conclusions to those I had come to [31]. Doctor Libra did more though. He found a circular enclosure of stones around the two monoliths, which remind us of the characteristics of many Atlantic and Mediterranean dolmens (Holland, Spain, Corsica, Sardinia, Apulia and Malta).
This style of construction, already analysed more to the north in Cava dei Servi, repeats the work of one and the same population widespread throughout the Iblean highlands. These people lived alongside another ethnic group, the one that elaborated and used the tombs in the rock. Both peoples jealously held on to the products of their own traditions.
The absence of elements that help the dating of the monument does not allow us to understand the age of it. However, its correspondence to the one we analysed in the previous paragraph encourages us to believe it is an artefact that goes back to the third or the primordial years of the second millennium B.C.; a phase of the early Bronze Age.
Technical data sheet of the monument
Height right monolith 1,06ms
width right monolith 0,84ms
thickness right monolith 0,75ms
height left monolith 1,06ms
width left monolith 0.76ms
thickness left monolith 0,37ms
Geographical map reference I.G.M. 1/25.000 – F° 276 I SE
References:
20 G. Di Stefano,Nuovissimi documenti tombali della prima età del bronzo a “Cava Lazzaro”, op. cit., p. 12
on; cf. also E.G. Picone, op. cit., pp. 40-45.
21 F. von Andrian, Präistoriche studien aus Sicilien, in «Zeitschrift für Ethnologie», Berlin, X, 1878, pp. 79-82.
22 L. Pigorini, Scoperte paletnologiche nel territorio di Modica, in «Bull. Di Paletn. It. », VIII, 1882, pp. 21-25.
23 Axes with the edge facing upwards were found in Carnac, Brittany, in one of the many dolmen of that place. Under the so-called Merchants’ Table in Locmariaquer, very near Carnac, a sculpted axe-plough figure can be seen, and in Manéer Hroec, Brittany, a perforated disklike jadeite axe was brought to light inside a Megalithic cell, as well as about a hundred axes tied up in bundles placed one above the other. (cf. R. Galles, Bull. Soc. Polym. Morbihan, VIII, 2-1863). Axes are also sculpted in the Megalithic complex of Stonehenge.
24P. Orsi, Nuovi documenti della civiltà premicenea e micenea in Italia, in «Ausonia», Year 1, 1906, pp. 7 on.
25 For this last decorative motif, cf. G. Libra, Quei sei triangoli equilateri, in «Le Timpe, Libro Antologico», Rosolini 2006, pp. 69-71.
26 Grotta Lazzaro, which takes its name from the quarry where it is to be found, is a cavern of Carsic (an arid stone, though not sterile) nature used as a refuge since the upper Paleolithic period (circ. 35,000 years ago).
27 F. Maugini, Scoperte preistoriche in Sicilia, in «Rivista scientifica industriale», 13th April 1879; cf. also P. Orsi, ibidem, pp. 5-6 [“Globuled bones” are small plates of bovine bone, finely decorated with embossed motifs that reproduce “oval globules” placed in a row. The Sicilian examples were found in the necropolises of Castelluccio, in Cava Lazzaro, in Sante Croci, in Monte Casale and in the Masella grotto, Buscemi. Others cropped up in the II and III levels (2700-2300 B.C.) of Troy, in Malta, in Lerna and in the Peloponnese in the strata that refers to the Middle Helladic period (2000-1580 B.C.)].
28 S. Tusa, La Sicilia nella preistoria, Palermo 1983, p. 320.
29 F. L. Belgiorno, I Siciliani di 15,000 anni fa, op. cit. p. 120.
30 G. Libra, Identificato un dolmen a Cava Lazzaro, in «Le Timpe, Libro Antologico», op. cit., pp. 73-75.
31 S. Piccolo, I dolmen nella Sicilia sud-orientale, in Graduation thesis of the “Scuola Universitaria diretta a fini speciali per Op. Tecnico-Scientifici per i beni Culturali ed Ambientali”, settore Archeologico, Palermo University, Faculty of Letters and Philosophy, Agrigento, Academic Year 1994-1995, pp 61-67.
This article concludes with a look at the Dolmen di Avola.
Information from Salvatore Piccolo's book,
"Antiche Pietre. La cultura dei dolmen nella preistoria della Sicilia sud-orientale",
Morrone editore, Siracusa 2007.
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6.1km WSW 246° Cava D'Ispica* Rock Cut Tomb
8.4km NW 308° Cava dei Servi* Burial Chamber or Dolmen
10.0km NNE 17° Castelluccio Necropolis Rock Cut Tomb
13.4km NE 54° Noto antica* Ancient Village or Settlement
20.0km N 360° Santoni* Carving
20.3km N 359° Akrai* Ancient Village or Settlement
23.7km ENE 75° Dolmen di Avola* Natural Stone / Erratic / Other Natural Feature
27.7km N 352° The neviere of Buccheri* Artificial Mound
30.8km NNE 20° Pantalica Rock Cut Tombs* Rock Cut Tomb
30.9km NNE 21° The Anaktoron Palace* Ancient Palace
37.6km ENE 58° Syracuse Temple of Olympian Zeus Ancient Temple
40.0km ENE 56° Syracuse Archaeological Park* Museum
40.3km W 270° Kamarina Ancient Village or Settlement
40.5km ENE 59° Ortigia Temple of Athena* Ancient Temple
40.7km ENE 59° Ortigia Temple of Apollo* Ancient Temple
40.8km ENE 58° Paolo Orsi Museo Archeologico Museum
44.3km NE 34° Megara Hyblaea* Ancient Village or Settlement
60.8km WNW 290° Archaeological museum (Gela)* Museum
63.4km WNW 290° Bagni Greci* Ancient Village or Settlement
63.9km WNW 290° Capo Soprano* Hillfort
64.8km NW 310° Monte Bubbonia* Chambered Tomb
72.1km NNW 329° Morgantina* Ancient Village or Settlement
74.0km NW 318° Villa imperiale del Casale* Ancient Palace
105.7km SSW 213° Ghajn Damma Stone Row* Stone Row / Alignment
106.2km SSW 213° Ghajn Damma Stones* Standing Stones
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