PEDROTTI1998-001 - archaeological find
Riparo Gaban, Martignano (Trento)
Italy - Trentino - Adige valley - Europe - Alpine
Function not recorded Candidate only
Source term: rombo sonoro
rombo sonoro = Italian for 'sounding rhomb', the standard Italian term for a bullroarer blade whirled on a cord.
High above the Adige at Trento, in the little hanging valley of Martignano, the Riparo Gaban shelter housed some of the finest bone carvers of Italy's first farming age. Among their works is a fish rendered on a bone plaque not ten centimetres long, pierced beside the eye and freckled with incised rings and strokes. Trentino's heritage office allows it two possible lives: a pendant at someone's throat, or a sounding rhomb - hung from a cord and whirled through the air until it gave out a sharp, evocative sound. The levels that yielded it date to around six thousand radiocarbon years ago.
Potrebbe essere un pendaglio o un rombo sonoro. In questo caso veniva fatto roteare nell'aria appeso ad una corda, così produceva un suono acuto e suggestivo.
It could be a pendant or a sounding rhomb. In that case it was whirled through the air hanging from a cord, producing a sharp, evocative sound.
Soprintendenza per i beni culturali, Provincia autonoma di Trento, A scuola con l'archeologia (2022), p. 6
- Object
- Fish-shaped bone plaque from the Early Neolithic Gaban Group levels, 9.6 x 2.3 cm (Pedrotti: length 9.5 cm), perforated near the fish's eye and incised with rings and strokes.
- Function
- Prehistoric use unrecorded; officially described as a pendant or a sounding rhomb.
- Map confidence
- low_medium - Martignano locality above Trento; the shelter opens in the Piazzina area on the eastern slope of the Adige valley, c. 80 m above the valley floor (LaBAAF site summary).
- Source location
- Pedrotti 1998:130, Fig. 12; Trento heritage booklet 2022:6