Pages: 12-39

In Italy the concept of a Copper Age was first proposed by Gaetano Chierici in 1884 after the discovery of the Remedello cemetery in Lombardy (northern Italy), where for the first time copper objects were recovered among the grave goods of c. 120 individual burials, and this followed the original identification of a Copper Age in central Europe by Pulzsky a few years before (Chierici 1884).  Chierici recognized the use of both copper and stone, particularly for axes and daggers, as characteristic of this cemetery, and for this reason coined the term Eneolitico, a term still used in Italian studies, and the equivalent of the more widely used Chalcolithic. The cemetery  of Remedello remained the only well known and  representative site of the northern Italian Copper Age for over 80 years, but since the 1970s an increasing number of new discoveries, also mainly of funerary sites, have clearly indicated that the situation is more wide-spread and complex. Moreover, further research during the last decade, such as the study of statue menhirs and the discovery of the Iceman,  have introduced new elements into the scenario reconstructed on the basis of previous data, so that a critical re-evaluation is now useful. In this paper we will briefly review the most important components of the cultural aspects considered as representative of the situation of the 4th millennium BC1  as well as the most recent research on the subject. At the same time we will highlight issues that in our opinion are of particular interest for further discussion.