Pollen and macroremains from Holocene archaeological sites: A dataset for the understanding of the bio-cultural diversity of the Italian landscape

Abstract

Over the last millennia, the land between the Alps and the Mediterranean Sea, characterized by extraordinary habitat diversity, has seen an outstanding cross-cultural development. For the first time, this paper reports on the census of the Holocene archaeological sites that have been studied as part of archaeobotany in Italy (continental Italy, the Italian peninsula and islands) over the last quarter in a century. Pollen, non-pollen palynomorphs, seeds and fruits, woods/charcoals and other plant remains have all been analysed in multidisciplinary researches. A list of 630 sites has been provided by more than 15 archaeobotanical teams. The sites are located across the 20 regions of Italy, and in the Republic of San Marino (356 sites in northern Italy, 118 in central Italy, 156 in southern Italy and on the islands). They belong to several cultural phases: 321 sites are only pre-Roman, 264 are Roman/post-Roman, and 45 sites cover a broader range of time, present in both time spans. Site distribution is plotted in maps of site density according to geographical districts and the main chronological phases. The reference list helps to find analytical data referring to the descriptive papers that may be scattered throughout monographs and specific books on the matter.