- Item
- AIAC_1666
- Name
- Viale Sabotino
- Date Range
- 1630 – 1630
- Monuments
- Cemetery
Seasons
-
AIAC_1666 - Viale Sabotino - 2005The construction of a large underground car park in the area between viale Sabotino and the walls of Spanish date visible near Porta Romana, made it necessary to undertake an open area rescue excavation. The zone corresponds to the strip of land between the fortified walls built in the second half of the 16th century (on the orders of the governor Ferrante Gonzaga in the name of Philip II of Spain) and the land outside the moat of the same walls. At only one metre further south of the line of the wall which for a long period constituted the boundary between city and countryside, a common grave 2.5 m wide and over 46 m long had been dug and probably very quickly refilled. There were at least 157 individuals whose skeletons were still articulated but in jumbled positions, often in a prone position (47 individuals) but also supine (74 individuals) and on their side (13 individuals). The remaining individuals were too fragmented to establish their position. Most of them were adults and only 14 individuals were identified as children or babies. The deceased were found in 16 distinct groups separated by dumps of rubble. The jumbled way in which they lie suggests that the bodies, without shrouds, were dumped directly from wagons into the pit. The haste to dispose of these bodies and their particular position inside the common grave suggests that death was caused by an epidemic, which in this period may be identifies as the plague. The presence of a “foppone” (a word from Lombard dialect meaning “great pit”) or emergency burial ground just outside the city limits conforms to the procedure documented in historic sources of the period.
FOLD&R
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285 - Valentina Caruso, Emanuela Sguazza, Francesca Sassi, Daniele Gibelli, Anna Ceresa Mori, Cristina Cattaneo - 2013Gli scheletri della fossa comune di viale Sabotino a Milano: le vittime della peste manzoniana?
Media
- Name
- Viale Sabotino
- Year
- 2005
- Summary
-
en
The construction of a large underground car park in the area between viale Sabotino and the walls of Spanish date visible near Porta Romana, made it necessary to undertake an open area rescue excavation.
The zone corresponds to the strip of land between the fortified walls built in the second half of the 16th century (on the orders of the governor Ferrante Gonzaga in the name of Philip II of Spain) and the land outside the moat of the same walls. At only one metre further south of the line of the wall which for a long period constituted the boundary between city and countryside, a common grave 2.5 m wide and over 46 m long had been dug and probably very quickly refilled. There were at least 157 individuals whose skeletons were still articulated but in jumbled positions, often in a prone position (47 individuals) but also supine (74 individuals) and on their side (13 individuals). The remaining individuals were too fragmented to establish their position. Most of them were adults and only 14 individuals were identified as children or babies.
The deceased were found in 16 distinct groups separated by dumps of rubble. The jumbled way in which they lie suggests that the bodies, without shrouds, were dumped directly from wagons into the pit. The haste to dispose of these bodies and their particular position inside the common grave suggests that death was caused by an epidemic, which in this period may be identifies as the plague. The presence of a “foppone” (a word from Lombard dialect meaning “great pit”) or emergency burial ground just outside the city limits conforms to the procedure documented in historic sources of the period. -
it
La costruzione di un grande parcheggio sotterraneo nell’area compresa tra viale Sabotino e le mura spagnole attualmente visibili nei pressi di Porta Romana, ha reso necessaria l’esecuzione uno scavo archeologico in estensione.
La zona corrisponde alla fascia di terreno compreso tra la cinta bastionata costruita nella seconda metà del XVI secolo (su disposizione del governatore Ferrante Gonzaga in nome di Filippo II di Spagna) e la campagna all’esterno del fossato della stessa opera di difesa: ad appena ad 1 metro più a sud del tracciato del muro che costituì per lungo tempo la demarcazione fra città e campagna, è stata scavata e poi riempita verosimilmente in un breve lasso di tempo, una fossa per una sepoltura comune larga m 2,5 e lunga più di m 46. Vi erano almeno 158 individui riscontrati anatomicamente articolati ma depositati in posizioni scomposte, spesso in giacitura prona (47 individui) ma anche supina (74 individui) e di fianco (13 individui). I restanti individui erano troppo frammentari per poterne stabilire la posizione. La maggioranza degli individui erano adulti e soltanto 14 corpi sono stati identificati come bambini o neonati.
I defunti sono stati trovati in 16 distinti gruppi separati fra loro da scarichi di materiale macerioso. Dal modo scomposto in cui giacciono si può intuire che i corpi, non fasciati, venivano scaricati direttamente dai carri nella fossa. La fretta di disfarsi di questi corpi e il loro dispiegamento particolare all’interno di una fossa comune, suggerisce una morte causata da un’epidemia infettiva che potremmo, in questo periodo, identificare con la peste. La presenza di un “foppone” o zona cimiteriale di emergenza poco al di fuori del limite della zona urbana risulta in conformità con la prassi documentata nelle fonti storiche di quel periodo. - Director
- Anna Ceresa Mori
- Research Body
- Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici della Lombardia
- Funding Body
- Impresa edile COMER s.r.l.
FOLD&R
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285 - Valentina Caruso, Emanuela Sguazza, Francesca Sassi, Daniele Gibelli, Anna Ceresa Mori, Cristina Cattaneo - 2013Gli scheletri della fossa comune di viale Sabotino a Milano: le vittime della peste manzoniana?
Media
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Marsden-Pagani 2008I. Marsden, C. Pagani, 2008, Milano, viale Sabotino. Indagini archeologiche, in NOTIZIARIO 2006. Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici della Lombardia, Milano: 119-122.