The Terramare/5 – Amber
1.
The amber found in the lower layers of the terramara at Castione Marchesi shows that this material was already reaching the Terramare area as early as the 15th–14th century BCE, and that within these communities there existed an elite to whom such valuable goods were reserved.
The shells, also recovered from the same site, may have originated from fossil deposits in the Apennine foothills. However, in some cases—thanks to the preservation of their natural inner color—we know they reached the settlement as true exotic items, collected from the sea shortly before being exchanged or gifted.
The variety of shell types—some from rocky shores, others from sandy coastlines—indicates contact with both coastal environments.
The tiny gold spiral is too fragmentary to reconstruct its original form, but remains a fascinating and mysterious find.
2.
At Beneceto, layers dating from the late 14th to the early 13th century BCE have yielded beads of various sizes and pendants, all more or less fragmentary.
The difference in their state of preservation compared to those from Castione Marchesi is primarily due to the differing characteristics of the soil in which they were buried for centuries.
3.
3. Among the prized objects in use between the 17th and 15th centuries BCE are small blue conical buttons with a hole running horizontally through their diameter.
Likely crafted by the same metalworking artisans, they were made of glassy faience—a vitreous material produced by fusing silica (the sand used for glassmaking), a mineral to aid the process (such as potassium), and copper, which gives them their characteristic blue color.
Extremely rare, sixteen examples have been found at the pile-dwelling site of Mercurago in Piedmont, and around ten in Terramare settlements—half of them from sites in the Parma area.