This was the third excavation campaign on the site in the locality of Li Schiavoni (Nardò-LE), an extensive plateau occupied by a small fortified Messapian settlement. The ancient walls, whose remains are visible below the dry-stone wall surrounding the plateau, forming a roughly elliptical shape, reach a length of about 650 m and delimit an area of c. 3 hectares. There was also a ditch up against the east side of the circuit that is clearly visible on aerial and satellite images.
The excavations were concentrated within an area of private agricultural land and aimed to gain an understanding of the type of settlement on the site and its phases, and to identify the remains of the curtain wall. The wall was exposed at several points on the west side, although only the foundation course was preserved. It is circa 3.50 m wide and formed by two facings of large irregular limestone blocks, resting directly on the bedrock (or in some stretches on a bed of gravel levelling the bedrock). The fill is made up of a mass of small and medium sized stones.

In all investigated sectors, the fortifications appeared to have been reinforced and enlarged in a later period, when a new fill was added, delimited by an internal facing wall, abutting the inner side of the first walls, already partially destroyed. This reinforcement of the original circuit wall seemed to have been an emergency intervention, as suggested by the numerous reused materials used in the fill (mainly imbrices, but also worked limestone blocks and tufa slabs) and the haphazard placing of the blocks in the internal facing, resting directly on the ground. Thanks to this addition, the wall reached a width of 7 m.

The study of the materials recovered from the levels associated with these structures is ongoing. However, they seem to attest constant occupation of the area predominantly in the archaic and Classical periods, although earlier finds datable to the Bronze and Iron Ages, and Hellenistic period were also present.
Excavation also took place in an area inside the settlement, where finds were documented – unfortunately decontextualised and jumbled – relating to the presence of burials (Leccese stone and tufa blocks and slabs, fragments of pottery from tomb groups).
One of the trenches in this zone revealed a picture of daily life: an embedded hearth and several impasto containers for dry foodstuffs were uncovered in a space that was used as a kitchen and/or larder.