SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS AT CASTIONE.
Such was the general tenor of the opinions in regard to the terremare up to 1877, when, owing to the interest then taken in these singular remains and with the view of clearing up some of the contested points, the Minister of Public Instruction ordered a fresh excavation to be made at Castione under the superintendence of Professor Pigorini. The portion selected was an oblong space at the north side of the church, beginning at the margin and stretching inwards for a considerable distance. The result of this was the disclosure of a new and remarkable feature in its structural arrangement. At the inside of the earthen dyke, and intervening between it and a forest of piles which extended towards the interior, was a series of small rectangular enclosures constructed of horizontal beams laid one above the other. These enclosures, which extended side by side like a string of log-houses, formed an abrupt facing to the dyke. The beams were roughly hewn, and partially mortised into each other at the points of crossing, from which their ends projected irregularly, some even extending from one compartment to the next. Inside these log-houses there was nothing but rubbish—clay, gravel, bits of wood, etc.—packed firmly together. But it is needless to enter upon all the details of this curious structure; suffice it to say that Pigorini came to the conclusion that their purpose was to support the inside of the earthen dyke (contrafforte dell' argine). The piles were in rows about two feet apart, and each pile was separated from its neighbour by an interval of one foot. When the space was cleared there was quite a forest of these piles, and it is noteworthy that they were all inclined in one direction, viz. north-east, a fact which is well shown in the first of the two photographic illustrations here given ([Fig. 82]).
From an examination of the composition of the soil outside the limits of the station Pigorini ascertained that the bluish clay bed forming the subsoil of the terramara mound corresponded to what was the surface of the surrounding plain when the terramaricoli founded their settlement, and that the thick mass of alluvial yellowish clay in which the mound is now partially buried has been subsequently deposited.
Fig. 82.—Two Views of the Piles and Woodwork exposed at Castione during the special excavations conducted by Prof. Pigorini in 1877.
Other interesting details are given in Pigorini's exhaustive and admirable report regarding the structure of the ditch, dyke, platforms, hearths, etc., and the peculiarity and composition of the strata. But these the limits at my disposal in this work compel me to pass over, and I must be content with quoting the following summary of his conclusions in regard to the origin of the station:—
"The terramaricoli having arrived at the place now called Castione dei Marchesi did not select for their encampment a low-lying spot subject to inundations, but the top of a slight elevation of bluish clay not yet covered with the more recent alluvial deposits. The space measured out for the station was of a rectangular shape and covered about a couple of acres. This area they surrounded with a ditch, the excavated soil being thrown to the inside and so they formed a dyke 6 feet in height, which consequently enclosed a bacino having its base on the original soil of the plain. The area thus defined had an orientated position with a deviation of 30° from east to north.
"Having completed the surrounding ditch and dyke, the next step was to construct along the inner margin of the dyke a series of log-houses, bound together and filled with débris, over which they finally laid a gravel pavement. The main object of this elaborate structure was to support the earthen dyke. Next they planted all over the bacino rows of piles at regular intervals, whose tops reached to the level of the surface of the contrafforte, and over them they laid horizontal planks of wood which, in certain places, were covered with beds of clay (tavole coperte d'argilla).
"On this platform were constructed the huts of the people. The exact form of these huts has not been ascertained, but they were certainly made of wood, straw and clay, no other material having been used either at Castione or any other terramara. The village was now complete, and the inhabitants, in the course of their domestic avocations, threw the refuse of food and other débris into the space below, probably by means of holes, which gradually accumulated until the space became completely filled up.