Several wood for several uses. Exploitation and selection at the pile-dwelling cave settlement Grotta di Pertosa

Grotte di Pertosa is a natural karst cave located on the northeastern slopes of the Alburni Mountains in Campania (Southern Italy). This cave housed a pile-dwelling settlement during the Middle and Late Bronze Age. A peculiar aspect of this archaeological site is the preservation of the protohistoric wooden structures thanks to the waters of the underground stream flowing in the cave. The most impressive evidence comprises the floors of two different pile-dwelling levels, which were first excavated in the late nineteenth century by Patroni and Carucci. These scholars published data concerning both the structures and the wooden artifacts discovered. Therefore, in this paper, a review of the inferred archaeobotanical data from their studies is provided. Fortunately, several wooden poles have been preserved in the riverbed area; they are still accessible and represent the main subject of this work. So far 86 poles, still deeply driven into the riverbed, have been identified and registered. Microscopic wood analysis has been conducted on 46 samples taken from as many poles during the 2009-2013 research campaigns; furthermore 20 wood samples of uncertain attribution, found in a rich organic material layer, have also been analyzed as well as charcoal preserved in the same archaeological stratum. A first result from this study is related to paleoenvironmental issues. The comparison between the archaeobotanical assemblages and the modern surrounding vegetation, in light of the paleoclimatic data available in the literature, allowed us to elaborate on a preliminary paleoenvironmental reconstruction and to speculate about the catchment areas of wood exploited. The archaeobotanical study provided also information about wood used for different purposes: building material, fuel and craft-activities.