Introduction

An archaeological survey, carried out in eastern-central Sicily by the Catania Institute for Archaeological and Monumental Heritage (National Research Council), has covered the upland landscape to the west and to the south of the town of Centuripe, the ancient Centuripae. The primary aim of the project was to build a diachronic picture of human occupation of the landscape from earliest times to the thirteenth century AD.

However, from the outset of the fieldwork, many remains of the 1943 Battle of Sicily, in the form of shell splinters, fired cartridge cases, bullets, live rifle cartridges (which were reported to the local police) and empty cans of rations, came to light and excited our curiosity. Such objects were discovered despite the fact that the land, for self-evident reasons, had never been metal-detected by us. They went unnoticed for almost seventy years for a number of reasons: they were well hidden or had been left in almost inaccessible places or they were not considered useful by local people who, in the post-war period, collected the copper objects (fuses and gun shell cases) and empty ammunition boxes to sell or recycle. The finding of live rifle ammunition, on the other hand, is rare because hunters, in the past, destroyed all those they found to re-use the gunpowder to recharge hunting cartridges.

In short, such significant evidence regarding the Allied invasion, probably the most important event involving twentieth-century Sicily, could not be neglected and is presented briefly here.

Figure 2.

Shell fragments (fuses).

Battlefield evidence

Centuripe lies on the easternmost hill of a chain some 4km long and 700m high (Figure 1). Numerous gun shell fragments, found covering the southern slopes of this hill chain almost uniformly, indicate that the area came under very heavy artillery fire from the south (Figure 2).

Two tails of British 3-inch mortar shells, exploded on the westernmost hilltop of the above-mentioned chain (Figure 1.1) and a similar live mortar shell, found in the same location (exploded), bear witness to the presence of someone very unpopular with Allied troops there. A 9mm parabellum cartridge case and a 7.92mm bullet (not fired) found on the same hilltop point to the presence of German soldiers. A gas mask container found further east belonged to a German soldier too. These records and numerous shell splinters represent convincing evidence of heavy fighting in this sector.

A steep spur of the same chain, to the south of the Centuripe cemetery (Figures 1.2 and 3), bears, preserved on its summit, further eloquent testimony to fighting: a German 9mm parabellum-calibre cartridge case, nine .303 British calibre ones, two live cartridges of the same type, a tail of a 2-inch British mortar shell, the upper part of a so-called 'bully beef' can, as well as the usual gun shell splinters (Figure 4). It seems that the spur, once occupied by the soldiers of one of the two fighting armies, was than taken by the other.

Figure 3.

The spur on which the artefacts illustrated in Figure 4 were recovered and the surrounding countryside.

Figure 4.

Evidence for fighting 65 years ago.

Figure 5.

Empty ration cans hidden under a mound of stones.

To the south of the town, in the countryside overlooking the Dittaino river valley, two other locations preserved palpable traces of the battle. In the first, southernmost one (Figure 1.3), there were a few shell splinters and a name, 'Müller Hugo', probably belonging to a German soldier, which was incised on the wall of a Bronze Age rock-cut tomb. The second location (Figure 1.4) shows astonishing evidence for a German gun position and a British camp. The gun position was documented by various empty containers of flak 88mm shells and by c. twenty 7.92 x 57 calibre German live cartridges discovered under a mound of stones. The latter, presumably found in the surroundings by a farmer and hidden, were the ammunition for small arms defending the gun. Meal remains - some seventy empty cans once containing rations - were found in the British bivouac area not far from the German gun position (Figure 5). These cans were hidden under heaps of stone 'so that they cannot be seen' from the air, as was recommended, for instance, on American 'K rations' packaging. Sporadic findings in other parts of the countryside give an idea of the size of the battlefield.

Figure 6.

An exceptionally well preserved 'compo rations' crate in a derelict farmhouse. Note the labelling '14 MEN COMPO'.

Perspectives

All these battlefield remains, left exactly where they were used or exploded in 1943, assume a documentary and historic value, as they allow the reconstruction of some episodes of the Battle of Sicily. Furthermore, it is through archaeological methods that we were able to document a short-lived event like the battle of Centuripe. For example, we have been able to infer from the cartridge cases alone, without the help of other records, the nationality of the soldiers who fought in the area.

The objects found in open fields and others recycled by farmers in the past (especially ammunition boxes) and found in derelict farmhouses (Figure 6) or donated to the Centuripe Archaeological Museum form the material basis for further analysis; this will also take into consideration written records to clarify what happened in the surroundings of Centuripe. This archaeological WWII era evidence is seen as contributing further data to what we already know from official sources.