The 2006 campaign was undertaken in September-October and concentrated on the prehistoric levels in Trenches IV, IX and X of the so-called ‘area Castello’. In all three cases the areas were situated in zones of the settlement adjoining the internal front of the Bronze Age fortifications and constituted the enlargement or deepening of trenches opened in previous seasons.

The investigations in SAS IV led to the extension of the excavation along the trench’s east side, thus extending the investigation of a large hut destroyed by fire in the Final Bronze Age 2. Below a thick layer of charcoal rich earth, resulting from the collapse of the walls and roof, the beaten clay floor was exposed, together with a rectangular hearth slab (85 cm long) made from clay mortar and crushed calcarenite hardened by fire. On the floor close to the hearth were numerous pottery vessels of impasto and plain ware with proto-geometric decoration, mostly intact or completely reconstructable. Among these was a large jar, embedded up to the rim in the floor.

By the north-western edge of the promontory (SAS IX) work begun in 2005 was completed, including the cleaning and checking of the stratigraphic sections and the completion of the graphic documentation. The investigations in this area had explored the southern end of the so-called ‘hut-temple’, bordered to the west and south by a pathway paved with loose stones. The removal of the latter revealed a complex stratigraphic sequence of levels and structures datable to between the Recent and Final Bronze Age. The evidence for the sub-Apennine settlement in this area comprised structures and spaces in front of the interior line of the fortifications. The latter were faced with parallelepiped calcarenite blocks and were preserved to a height of over 3 m. The archaeological levels produced substantial quantities of impasto pottery and numerous Aegean type terracotta figurines.

Excavations in SAS X extended the 2005 trench and checked the stratigraphic sequence relating to phases IV and III. The excavation of phase IV (Final Bronze Age 1) revealed, in the western part of the trench, a cobbled floor with a hearth (a conchoidal cavity circa one metre in diameter, completely filled with ash and charcoal fragments) and a series of large impasto containers of closed form. To the east there was a beaten floor surface and the post holes from part of a hut that was apparently destroyed by fire, it produced only a modest amount of archaeological material. The excavated layers relating to phase III (late Bronze Age 2) documented occupation levels, the floor surface and numerous post holes from a hut reused as a workshop dealing with hard animal materials. Among the finds were numerous hippopotamus teeth.