Determinismo geografico? Il caso ligure: una catena montuosa fra costa e pianura, nel passaggio dall'età del Bronzo all'età del Ferro

This paper returns to the question of “environmental determinism” in order to understand the extent to which the morphology of the Ligurian territory, characterised by extreme variations from the sea to the mountains and from the mountains to the plains, determined the formation and definition of cultural groups, social orders and settlement strategies. The analysis covers a chronological span ranging from the Final Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age. The most commonly attested settlement type in the Final Bronze Age was the hill site (called “castellaro”), predominantly centred on silvopastoral activities, but there are also examples of coastal sites which were well integrated with the inland mountains. At the beginning of the Early Iron Age there are signs of the emergence of a new form of spatial planning. First of all, differences emerge between the settlement organization strategies of western and eastern Liguria: in the west the scattered hill-site system continues but in the inland mountains of the east there seems to have been a process of depopulation in which long established settlements are abandoned in favour of coastal sites, the main example is Chiavari. Although, as is well known, this period represents an historical turning point which is marked by the growth of proto-urban centres across the Italian Peninsula, Liguria remains an exception. Apart from Genua, in whose development the Etruscans played a decisive role, the settlement strategies in the territory of Liguria, following a trend from the Early Iron Age to the 5th Century BC, are rather characterised by hill-site settlements, with a pre-urban social organization.