Architecture of Earth in Lucania

In Italy, the self-building has been a widespread practice just until the second half of the last century. Basilicata is one of Southern regions where the self-building has deeply marked the connotative traits of the landscape. Many of the its rural built heritage has been built using by ancient technique of raw earth. The work illustrates the preliminary results of multidisciplinary research activity focused on recovery and innovations of raw earthen construction technologies. The goal of the study is the industrialization and mass production of raw earth technologies through the implementations of smart manufactories of innovative materials. Considering the high variability of raw earth in function of the environmental and cultural characteristics of the places, the first phase of the research has consisted in the acquisition of information and knowledge on the various construction techniques in raw earth in different geographical locations. In particular, the work describes the functions and types of earthen construction widespread in the internal territories of the region. The surveyed buildings consist of single-storey agricultural sheds and single or double-storey houses. The construction technology involves the construction of masonry with the technique of Adobe locally known as "ciucioli".