Patella candei (Lapa Mansa) proveniente do Sepulcro 1 dos Perdigões
The
Portuguese large Prehistoric enclosures present many differences regarding the
smaller ones: apart from size, they have longer and more complex biographies,
evidences of a multitude of social practices (including manipulation of human
and animal remains and funerary practices) and show that they were engaged in
large interregional networks of circulation of people, animals and exotic
goods.
Perdigões
is a good example of this large scale interaction developing from the second
half of the 4th millennium BC and increasing during the 3rd.
A paper addressing the exogenous at Perdigoes is about to get published, but
another is being written specifically about one item: the shells. A significant
number are shells from salty water molluscs, with probable provenance in the
coast of Alentejo and the estuaries of the Tagus and Sado rivers.
Though, this
shell of Patella candei, with
8,4x6,7cm, is not from those areas. This species is from warmer waters of
Madeira and Canarias islands and the coast of Magreb. Like the ivory already
analysed, its origin is probably in Northwest of Africa, documenting that at
Perdigões enclosure exogenous items of extra peninsular origin were arrinving.
PS – Last week
we just found out that there is also Amber at Perdigões, reinforcing this
picture.
