Grotta del Romito: evidenze archeologiche, ricostruzioni e ipotesi sulle orme del sacro

Grotta del Romito is one of the most important Upper Palaeolithic sites in Italy. Its well-known evidence related to art and funeral practices suggests a specific use of the cave’s space for ritual and ceremonial purposes during the Late Epigravettian (from 12.500 to 11.000 uncal. BP). The authors propose hypotheses related to various evidence: the location of two big engraved boulders in the actual rock shelter that seems to bound a natural space inside which funerary practices were held; the symbolic value (totemic?) of the engraved auroch as a catalyst figure in the outermost area of the site; the location of three single burials inside the cave, situated very close to one another; the probable symbolic value of some of the cave’s substructures.