Those who appreciate the greatness of that culture of the past, which made Basilicata and a large part of southern Italy so much part of the history of Mediterranean civilizations, can only wait to learn more from the presentation of the book by the general director of the Museums Massimo Hosanna ” New world. Journey to the origins of Magna Grecia’, published by Rizzoli, ‘which will be presented in Matera, on 28 June, at 6.30 pm, at the House of Emerging Technologies. A place known more for conferences than for institutional activities. The presentation was organized by the Zetema Foundation in collaboration with Antonio Minonne and with the patronage of the Municipality of Matera. “New world. Journey to the origins of Magna Graecia” is an interesting work that offers many food for thought on the history, culture and archeology of the area and on what can and must be done to enhance it, safeguarding the identity of the sites and the roots of the past. A timeless journey that passes through archaeological sites, museums, libraries and the cities that reach from Magna Graecia to the Motherland.
Synopsis
«This is a book of stories. It concerns the events of some ancient people who lived in the 1st millennium BC in the territories of Magna Graecia. It is a story of mobility and encounters, because for everyone, Greeks and Italians, the network of connections and relationships with others were the most significant existential feature of daily life.» This is the “new world” that gives the title to Massimo Osanna’s essay: a landscape of encounter that only archeology can help us rediscover, giving voice to objects and structures that are in themselves silent, telling who created them, used them , transformed into memory or destroyed. Finds «capable of narrating the stories of men and peoples who met, faced each other, amalgamated in a dynamic and seamless process in this land». Through a journey to more or less well-known archaeological parks and museums in our South (from Sibari to Taranto, from Metaponto to Paestum, passing through Crotone, Venosa, Caulonia), Osanna illuminates the relationship between Greeks and non-Greeks, never unambiguous or predictable; he redefines the very idea of ”colonization” as we commonly imagine it, shifting the emphasis to the hybridization phenomena that were frequent and articulated in Magna Graecia. A compelling work on the memory of objects (materiality of contacts), of places (the landscapes of the plot), on the memory of the dead (what the tombs tell us), because archeology is fundamental for reconstructing the stories not told by History (the background noise of the fragments, «alive» and «speaking»).
MASSIMO OSANNA
General Director of Museums. Massimo Osanna is Full Professor of Classical Archeology at the University of Naples “Federico II”, and is General Director of Museums at the Ministry of Culture. Between 2014 and 2020 he directed the Special Superintendence for Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabia and then the Archaeological Park of Pompeii.
