Il lato oscuro delle città

The archaeology of premodern urbanism is a growing field of research. In the cross-cultural and com- parative study of the deep history of human settlement and activity, archaeology plays a pivotal role. It is the sole discipline capable of revealing alternative and heterogenous forms of urbanism, and of dis- covering surprising and unexpected cities in regions and periods that have been hitherto overlooked by traditional approaches. This multifaceted scenario encompasses a range of phenomena, including temporary agglomerations, low-density megasites, cities that precede the formation of states, and col- lective or acephalous forms of government. In recent years, there has been a notable shift in research focus towards the social aspects of coming together, both positive and negative. The first includes, for example, energized crowing, while the latter are the so-called ‘urban graveyard effect’ and the effects of scalar stress. This paper presents a brief examination of the urban phenomenon, with a particular focus on the negative aspects, questioning and reassessing traditional understandings of urbanisation, that is the processes of concentrating people and activities. The first is the so-called ‘urban graveyard effect’, a term used to describe a two-step process that operated in past and modern cities: The elevated preva- lence of disease in urban areas resulted in a higher mortality rate than in rural regions. This, in turn, necessitated a significant influx of individuals from rural to urban areas to sustain the urban popula- tion. Moreover, a focus on the formative decades of settlements shows they are often characterised by a high degree of chaos and disorder, with tensions and risks that can potentially result in the collapse and abandonment of the site. From an epistemological standpoint, it is also notable that archaeologists tend to ascribe greater signif- icance to the categories of cities and urbanism, which are accorded a high level of prestige.