Torre S. Sabina. L’approdo ritrovato

New excavations in the Torre S. Sabina bay, 25 km north of Brindisi, Apulia, along the Adriatic coast, are being carried out since 2007, by the Department of Cultural Heritage of Salento University, in an area partially investigated in the past (1972-1983). The seabed preserves the remains of various cargos and various wooden hulls. The best preserved one, Torre S. Sabina 1, already known in literature, lays at a depth of only 2.5 m in the Camerini inlet, few meters from the shore. It had been carried on the beach, perpendicular to the shore. The exceptional interest of the wreck is due to the partial preservation of the deck, with a few stanchions, deck beams and remains of overdeck beams, only rarely preserved in the wrecks. Furthermore, on the other side of the bay, the excavations focus on a limited, but still intact, deposit, which is densely stratified; it was thus possible to distinguish 2 layers, which, though disturbed by wave action, seem to be in place (i.e. in primary deposition). The upper layer yielded a large number of Salento wine and oil amphorae, produced in the well-known production facilities of the area around Brindisi. Apart from these, numerous amphorae of eastern production have been identified, mainly from the Aegean (Coan, Cnidian, Thasian, etc.), and an almost entire Punic amphora, which suggest the thriving nature of the commercial network in which the Salento area was involved between the end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 1st c. BC. Together with the amphorae, a large amount of other ceramic material has been recovered. Common wares of the Roman, and especially the Late Republican, period are found in substantial quantities. Fabrics can be connected to Aegean and eastern Adriatic productions. For example, quite impressive is the quantity of Megarian bowls possibly imported from sites of the Anatolian Coast. Based on stratigraphic observations, we hypothesize that a large part of the material recovered can be attributed to a Late Republican cargo, possibly comprising amphorae, and perhaps tiles (ballast to be sold?), of local production, as well as wine amphorae from the Aegean area, which travelled together with eastern fine and cooking wares. These products probably followed a redistribution trade pattern which must have been centred at Brundisium. The eastern imports, once at Brindisi, where shipped together with local productions to be redistributed to other destinations, probably following vertical routes along the Adriatic coast.