My doctoral thesis seeks to build a new understanding of the Orientalizing period (ca. eighth and seventh centuries BCE) within central Italy by investigating how imported materials from the eastern Mediterranean were used, accepted, and transformed throughout Italian communities. It examines entire cemetery groups centering on four case studies (Pian della Conserva, Terni, Colfiorito di Foligno, Campovalano), rather than on only princely tombs, between the Adriatic and Tyrrhenian Seas. I am conducting a multilayered contextual analysis within each cemetery, identifying typology, decoration, and function of the imported grave goods. In addition my work goes beyond the funerary sphere by including a contextual assessment of foreign objects within settlement, production, and sanctuary contexts. More broadly, my project explores ideas of cultural exchange, identity formation, and the ways in which local communities incorporate and manipulate foreign objects and concepts.