Since the 1970s, the Metaponto Project has investigated the chora (or territory) of the Greek colony of Metapontum (Basilicata, south- ern Italy). The project has used techniques such as geoarchaeology and field survey, as well as more in-depth investigations of a cross-section of rural site types: cemeteries, sanctuaries, a ceramic production centre and farmsteads. The project now constitutes one of the major long-term Mediterranean landscape archaeology projects, and its results are the subject of an ambitious publication series funded by the Packard Humanities Institute. A significant part of the field surveys and several excavations have been published in the first four volumes; this fifth instalment presents the investigations, undertaken in 1980, of a Hellenistic farmstead at Ponte Fabrizio.

Following an introduction that contextualises the site in its regional and micro-regional settings, the volume is divided into three parts. The first provides a concise overview of the investigations, the resulting data and their interpretation, while the second and third parts present a detailed discussion of the ecofactual and artefactual evidence. Numerous photographs, plans, 3D reconstructions, tables and diagrams (many in colour) support the text; appendices provide summaries of the ceramic and botanical data.

Although sixth- and fifth-century BC stratigraphy and artefacts are attested, the principal excavated farmhouse structure was occupied between the late fifth to early fourth and the start of the third centuries BC. It probably consisted of five (in a later phase, six) rooms and external activity areas. The ceramic and botanical evidence suggests that this farm, embedded in regional economic networks, relied on a combination of cereal cultivation and pastoral activities. Specific attention is paid to domestic cult practices, as attested by a terracotta plaque and figurines. The architectural comparisons are accompanied by an appendix that provides a comprehensive record of excavated farmhouses in southern Italy and, more selectively, the wider Greek world.

The ecofactual data, presented in Part II, are very limited: only 8 fragmentary animal bones and 13 marine shells were collected during the excavations. Botanical data, gathered almost 30 years after the excavations from section baulks left at the site, provide more substantive information on ancient land-use practices and vegetation. The ceramic evidence from the site is abundant and extensively discussed in Part III, presenting fabric studies (illustrated, in exemplary fashion, with high-resolution colour images), ware-based typological work and thorough quantification.

I have, however, two minor criticisms. Although the cohesion between the many specialist contributions is generally good, there are some instances where statements in different chapters are not precisely aligned. For example, whereas the synthetic chapter on the rural economy cautiously concludes that “economic life at Fattoria Fabrizio had a pastoral component” (p. 113), the botanical specialists more firmly state that “pastoral management was a major activity” (p. 138).

A second concern is directed towards the quantification of the ceramics. While the use of sherd counts, estimated vessels represented (EVR) and minimum number of individuals (MNI) is thorough and a major asset of this publication, the use (and meaning) of some statistics is not well explained or argued. For some ceramic classes, a typological number of individuals is used, but it is unclear what this statistic actually represents (if it is the minimum number of types present in the assemblage, I do not understand how this figure can be higher than the MNI, as is the case in tables 13.2, 16.1 and 20.1). Also, the EVR in the excavation assemblage is compared with the sherd counts from the surface assemblages of farm sites encountered during the field surveys, with the argument that these assemblages are comparable, but it is not made clear whether and why this is a valid comparison to make.

The excavation and the site itself are not exceptional. The farmhouse was only partly preserved, and there are uncertainties over its reconstruction—the authors prefer a reconstruction of two rows of three rooms, but do not entirely exclude the possibility of a third. Also, as sieving was apparently not part of the excavation strategy, and as areas outside the farm that may have contained domestic rubbish were not targeted for excavation, the ecological data are limited. Thus, the reconstruction of the economy is based mainly on ceramic data and is consequently partial. Nonetheless, the publication provides a valuable addition to the corpus of excavated farms and contributes to our understanding of the variety of sites across the chora of Metaponto and, more generally, to an understanding of ancient rural economies. The book is therefore of interest to anyone concerned with the development of rural landscapes, particularly of Hellenistic Magna Graecia.

The main value of the volume, however, lies in the detailed presentation of the ceramic data. There are still few Mediterranean excavations that have systematically collected and fully published all ceramics, including coarse- and kitchen-wares, combining typological and fabric-based research. Despite the observations above regarding some of the quantification, this volume presents the material in textbook fashion. It thus not only provides a useful source publication for ceramic specialists, but it also permits the integration of these ceramic data into a variety of broader qualitative and quantitative studies, such as the reconstruction of regional and supra-regional exchange networks, the quantitative comparison of survey and excavation assemblages, and the study of the cultural dimensions of ceramic consumption in the context of Greek-indigenous interactions.

It is the potential contribution to these wider questions that makes excavations such as those at Ponte Fabrizio so important: they provide ‘peep holes’ into the cultural and economic dimensions of ancient Mediterranean landscapes that complement the necessarily superficial view provided by field surveys. The five clear and thorough publications delivered by the Metaponto Project to date provide exceptional insight into the development of this Greek colonial landscape. It can only be hoped that in due course they will be complemented with additional volumes on the remaining surveys and excavations.