Greek and Greek Style Cooking Ware in Ancient Italy

Over the past two decades, archaeological research has made significant progress in the field of ancient food preparation and consumption. This has involved integrating pottery analysis with chemical, faunal, and archaeobotanical investigations. In this paper, we will focus on a specific set of cooking devices of Greek origin that played a pivotal role in the Western Mediterranean region during the 1st millennium BCE. The introduction of a basic and standardised set of culinary vessels and utensils, including portable charcoal basins and cookers, has had a significant impact on food processing traditions in the Mediterranean region, particularly from the 6th century BCE onwards. This resulted in the dissemination of innovative culinary techniques and dietary habits. The objective of this paper is to investigate how the emergence of a form of “haute cuisine” influenced the interaction among local traditions in Italic, Etruscan, and Western Greek settlements, a process shaped by acculturation, adaptation, and imitation. This article presents a series of case studies that provide novel data on context- based assemblages of cooking sets, including key sites from Etruria Padana, Southern Italy, and Sicily. The cultural and social aspects will be given particular attention, as imported cooking vessels and their replicas are frequently associated with mobility and evolving identities of individuals and larger groups.