Ceramics for the sugar production in Pisa. The excavation in Piazza Carrara

In 2016 a preventive archaeological excavation was carried out in Piazza Carrara, located north of the Arno River, on the western side of the medieval city, as part of the ‘Isole Ecologiche Interrate’ project of the Municipality of Pisa. The remains of a late medieval building were found, one of whose rooms below the Renaissance floor level was occupied by a thick clay deposit that obliterated a large quantity of pottery for refining cane sugar. The compartment may have been an underground room or cellar later filled with clay deposits which encapsulated the objects it contained, due to a flood episode of the nearby river. Some Pisan sgraffito slipware allow us to date the obliteration at the second half-end of the 16th century. The aim of this contribution is to present for the first time this ceramic context related to sugar processing, which appears unique in the Tuscan city and regional panorama.