The Baratti and Populonia Archaeological Park extends over 80 hectares from the slopes of the Piombino headland
to the Gulf of Baratti. History and archaeology coexist in a beautiful, unspoilt landscape there, where Etruscan
and Roman tombs and buildings emerge from the Mediterranean scrub against a clear, blue backdrop. Populonia,
one of the main Etruscan cities and the only coastal one, controlled the sea from Poggio di Castello.
The “industrial” districts lay around the Gulf of Baratti, near the harbour.
Its territory in
ancient times included the hills which surround the gulf and extend as far south as the Piombino headland
before sloping towards the hinterland to a wide plain bound by the Campiglia hills, which, together with the
Isle of Elba, were rich in mineral resources and had been exploited since the Neolithic age. The city was
created by the fusion of several Iron Age villages, each of which had its own necropolis, with well, sarcophagus
and chamber tombs.
The latter was covered with a false cupola and external tumulus and contained personal objects,
pottery and arms, some of which arrived by sea from Sardinia. The richest tombs document the economic and social
rise of several families, a phenomenon that became most evident in the VII century. In sumptuous monumental burial
mounds with quadrangular funerary chambers, the deceased were laid on stone beds together with a wealth of
paraphernalia, including objects for toiletry, banquets, ceremonies and parades.
Some of these were locally
produced (bronze utensils, bucchero vases), some imported in Greek ships (Phoenician tripod plates, vases from
Greece and the East, etc.) In the V century BC, the city was one of the most important iron working centres of
the ancient world.
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