In this innovative partnership that brings premodern historians together with archaeological scientists, we wish to reconstruct the daily lives and activities of a closed community of monastic women, who lived in the Cistercian monastery of S. Maria della Stella in Saluzzo, near Turin, during the 18th century.
The site has yielded a rich record of bioarchaeological evidence (human remains) and archival texts. We are mining both sources and comparing the information we obtain from each, in order to advance methodology. The human remains are being studied using traditional osteology and palaeopathology as well as micromorphology on dental calculus and multi-omic techniques.
Funded by
Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Principal Investigator
- Prof. Alison I Beach, St Andrews University
- Prof. Beatrice Demarchi, University of Turin
Co-Investigators & collaborators
Dr Rosa Boano (University of Turin), Dr Cynthianne Spiteri.
PhD Student
- Sarah Sandron in collaboration with Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Saluzzo
