In dealing with the indigenous non-Hellenic people of Southern Italy and their pottery, we are almost more at a disadvantage than in regard to the Etruscans. The peoples are almost unknown to us, and are vaguely characterised as “Iapygian,” “Messapian,” “Oscan,” and so on; but this does not really carry us much further. Moreover, this part of Italy has never been scientifically or thoroughly excavated, like Etruria, and even where finds have been made they are small and poor; nothing of very remote date appears to have come to light, and very few early Greek importations. Hence there has been until quite recently no attempt made at a scientific study of the pottery, or even to distinguish local from imported wares; in Heydemann’s catalogue of the Naples vases it is practically ignored. Recently, however, Herr Max Mayer, and Signor Patroni, whose laudable investigations of the Graeco-Italian vases have already received attention (Chapter XI.), have turned their attention to the study of the less promising indigenous fabrics.[[2377]]
The region with which the present section deals is that comprised by the three districts of Apulia, Lucania, and Campania. The barbarian races by which it was occupied in classical times were known by various names, used with some vagueness; but roughly we may divide them into two groups: the Iapygians or Messapians and the Peucetians, occupying the south-east portion of the peninsula from modern Bari to the end of the “heel”[[2378]]; and the Osco-Samnites, who occupied Campania and the mountainous district of Samnium on its north-eastern border. In Lucania the district of Sala Consilina has yielded local pottery.[[2379]] The Osco-Samnites appear to have been more amenable to the influence of Greek civilisation than the others, owing to the existence in their midst of such centres of culture as Cumae, Capua, and Poseidonia (Paestum); hence we find that the pottery of that region shows a much more Hellenic character than that of Apulia, and is more like that of Etruria in its attempts to imitate the Greek imported fabrics (see Vol. I. p. [484]).
Greek painted vases are found in Southern Italy as early as the seventh century B.C., though even in “Aegean” times they had penetrated as far as Sicily, and even Marseilles (see Vol. I. pp. [69], [86]).[[2380]] At Cumae in particular, and also at Nola, “Proto-Corinthian” and Corinthian wares have been found; during the sixth century Ionic and Attic B.F. wares make their appearance, but never in large quantities, as in Etruria. They, however, gave rise to a class of imitative fabrics found chiefly in Campania: small amphorae and other forms rudely painted with black silhouettes, dating from the fifth century. At Tarentum the finds of vases have been mainly Greek, but even these are comparatively rare. The principal examples of local wares are to be seen in the museums of Bari, Lecce, Taranto, and Naples; the British Museum, Louvre, and Berlin only possess isolated specimens.[[2381]] The general scarcity of imports is due, Signor Patroni thinks, to the restricted intercourse between the colonies on the coast and the interior districts peopled by hostile local tribes. After the fifth century, when large numbers of Greek artists were established in the towns of Southern Italy, the circumstances became different, and we have already made in Chapter XI. a general survey of the various fabrics produced from that time in the various centres down to the total decay of the art.
All Italiote pottery, before this direct influence of Hellenism made itself felt, may be called “archaic”; but it must at the same time be borne in mind that these archaic types still went on during the time of Greek influence. They formed, in fact, a “domestic” style, as opposed to the “high-art” style of the Graeco-Italian wares, just as the early Geometrical pottery of Athens is thought to have been in relation to the Mycenaean vases (see Vol. I. p. [279]). They must not, however, be regarded—as has been done by some writers—as deliberate archaistic revivals of older fabrics. It is true that they bear a remarkable resemblance in many cases to Aegean, Cypriote, and Geometrical wares; but this likeness is due to other causes, being the result of development, not of direct imitation. A learned Italian, on first seeing some of the local pottery excavated in Apulia, exclaimed, “This is the Mycenaean style of Italy.” Chronologically and ethnographically he was wrong, but artistically he was right; and as Signor Patroni has pointed out, parallels to nearly all the ornamental motives of local Apulian fabrics may be traced in Mycenaean pottery.
There is also a favourite shape, that of a large double-mouthed askos, examples of which may be seen in the British Museum (F 508 = Fig. [185], and F 509), which is obviously derived directly from the Mycenaean “false-necked amphora” (see Vol. I. p. [271]). It is not a Hellenic type, although it is the forerunner of a form of askos found among the painted vases of Apulia.[[2382]] Another favourite form, which Signor Patroni calls the orcio appulo, a jar with three vertical handles round the nearly spherical body, and wide-spreading mouth, may similarly be derived from the Mycenaean three-handled pyxis (Vol. I. p. [272]). Other forms, again, are parallel with those of Cyprus, as is in some cases the system of geometrical decoration, a figure or pattern in a panel with borders of geometrical ornament.
The writers above-mentioned distinguish two main classes of the local pottery of Apulia (including the south-eastern extremity or “heel” of Italy). The central portion of this district was inhabited by a tribe known as the Peucetii, and the extremity by Messapians, or, as they are also styled, Iapygians. The vases, which appear to be the product of the latter race, are found in various places—such as Brindisi, Egnazia or Fasano, Lecce, Nardo, Ostuni, Otranto, Putignano, Rugge, Taranto, and Uzento—and they may best be studied in the museum at Bari. The pottery of the Peucetii, which Signor Patroni calls Apulian, covers the region round Bari, including Putignano on the south, Bitonto and Ruvo on the north, where the local civilisation seems to have been modified by the influence of such centres as Canosa.
FIG. 185. ASKOS OF LOCAL APULIAN FABRIC (BRITISH MUSEUM).
The typical form of Messapian pottery is a krater with high angular handles, at the highest and lowest points of which are pairs of discs (rotelle), a spherical body, and neck sloping inwards, without lip. The form is one which, as we have seen in Chapter [XI]., was adopted by the Greek vase-painters in Lucania at a later date.[[2383]] Mayer states that this form is only found in the “heel” of Italy, but Patroni seems to imply that it is typical of Central Apulia.[[2384]] It is painted in two colours—purple-red and dark brown or black; but the former colour is not found in the earlier examples. The decoration includes simple geometrical or vegetable patterns, such as wreaths, panels of lozenge-pattern, zigzags, and an ornament composed of two triangles point to point
