Archaeologists uncover mother, child burial in Italy

During an archaeological excavation campaign that has been underway for three weeks in Siponto, a few kilometers from Manfredonia in the province of Foggia, Italy, a team of archaeologists from the universities of Bari and Foggia has discovered a medieval cemetery dating back to the 12th–13th centuries, containing dozens of burials. Among them is a particularly moving burial of a mother embracing her young child.

ArcheoSipontum announced the discovery in a statement shared on its social media profiles, CE Report quotes ANSA.

“Excavations resumed three weeks ago in the port area of Siponto,” archaeologist Giuliano Volpe, a professor at the University of Bari, told. “About a week ago, during the excavations, we discovered a 30-meter-long masonry structure, and inside it a real cemetery containing around 30 individuals who appear to have been buried there in aligned rows.

Most of them are adults, with the exception of a few children. Among the remains, we identified a woman between 30 and 40 years old who was holding her child with her right arm, presumably a boy or girl between four and five years old.

We will now carry out detailed examinations of the bones and anthropological analyses to date the discovery more precisely and, above all, determine whether the child was a boy or a girl.

We will continue the excavations to investigate whether a religious building may also have been present at the site. At this stage, several hypotheses regarding the discovery are being considered.”

The excavations in Siponto are being conducted by the University of Bari, with professors Giuliano Volpe and Giovanni De Venuto, and the University of Foggia, with professors Maria Turchiano and Roberto Goffredo.

Students from both universities are also taking part in the project, along with several students from the Scacchi High School in Bari as part of an internship program.

Photo: Chat GPT