As part of the research programme ”Ignobilia oppida Lucanorum” promoted by the Ecole Française in Rome in collaboration with the Archaeological Superintendency of Basilicata, a fourth excavation campaign took place on the site of Serra del Cedro. Work concentrated on the large pastas house “alpha” (11.50 × 19.80 m), discovered in 2016. The excavation, begun last year, of the large pastas house occupying the entire eastern part of the house (18.01 × 4.53 m = 81.5 m2), was completed. Of note the almost total absence of tiles and imbrices and, more generally, the scarcity of the finds. The three rooms to the rear were half-excavated in order to obtain a stratigraphic north-south section 15.60 m long, of which an orthophoto was taken. The walls and floor surfaces lay below an average of 1 .50 m of material in room 2 (north) , but the fill in room 4 (south) was only 55-56 cm deep due to the sloping terrain. The actual archaeological stratigraphy only began in correspondence with the wall crests. Their preserved height varied between 32 cm (wall 164 between room 3 and 4) and 50 cm (wall 163, between rooms 2 and 3; the latter was 55-60 cm wide and presented three courses of sandstone and limestone blocks, with reused elements, in particular a fragment from the bowl of a louterion.
In 2017, rooms 2 and 4 were partially explored, while the excavation of the large rectangular central space, ? x 4.60 m, was postponed. In rooms 2 and 4, the floor level was only reached in two small trenches. In room 2, to the north, the trench was a 2.20 m square. Layer 185 overlay the geological substratum of pudding-stone, which had been levelled to form the floor surface. Occasional tile and imbrices fragments lay directly on top of the pudding-stone. There were abundant finds including a fragmented but almost complete small ribbed olpe in ‘ceramica sovradipinta’. Several black glaze ware forms were also found: a small plate with a Z-shaped profile, the rim of a lekane, at least two small low concave-convex cups, several_skyphoi_, a fragment from kylix with vertical handles, probably of Daunian production with an offset on the inner surface of the bowl, Morel type 4221, datable to about the mid or second half of the 4th century B.C. (a new form for Civita di Tricarico). A few fragments of what may be grey ware were recovered but this remains to be verified.
There were over 300 fragments of coarse wares, but less than 30 of cooking wares. In addition, 6 loom weights were found, 5 truncated pyramid shaped (one stamped with a six-point star in a circle) and one truncated cone shaped. Bone fragments, teeth and two jaw fragments were also present. It is interesting to note that the walls rested on the pudding-stone, but were raised (by 17-18 cm) with respect to the floor surface, which was excavated and levelled after the walls were built. This probably prevented humidity from rising into the earth bonding in the walls, in particular when the floor was washed. In 2015, a similar solution was also identified in another building in trench 4. To date a trench measuring 4.70 × 2.30 m has been excavated in Room 4. The collapse of tiles and imbrices was relatively dense. Eight joining fragments of a large terracotta basin (reconstructed diameter 59.5 cm), only 8 cm deep and with thick walls (over 2 cm) were found abutting the north jamb of the wide entrance (c. 1.60 m) to the room. This basin allowed whoever entered to wash.