0364 - They keep appearing.

At Perdigões enclosure we are now studying the several funerary structures in the context of the project “Mobility and Interaction in South Portugal RecentPrehistory: the role of aggregation centers”. One of the structures is Pit 40, where cremated human remains were deposited. There are thousands of small fragments of burned bones that are being studied in anthropological terms, and among them fragments of ivory items, also burned, keep appearing.

Several represent parts of anthropomorphic figurines like the ones from the same general context already studied and published (Valera & Evangelista, 2014).

Here is the head of one that lost its face. It presents the hair, the ears and even the final traces of the facial tattoos.

A head like the best preserved one, only smaller.

Number of these figurines is now higher than what it was published and will probably grow as the study of the bone fragments progress. The figurines, like the human bodies, are all in small fragments and burned. Would have this analogy been intentional?

On the contrary, the exception above, when deposited, was intentionally completed in a broken leg with a burned white bone (see publication). Body segmentation and body integrity, parts and wholes. Or windows to the Neolithic mind. Something to be discussed in a coming workshop in Lisbon.

0363 - Astronomic orientation of gates: also documented in Spain

Orientation of NE gate at Camino de las Yeseras (After Liesau 2013-2104).

The cosmological and astronomic bond of ditched enclosures architectures in Iberia was first addressed in Portugal (Valera 2008; Valera, Becker 2011, Valera 2013). In the context of that research, it was noted that several ditched enclosures present topographical locations towards East and that several of them have their gates aligned with the solstices and/or equinoxes at sunrise and/or sunset. Those are the cases of Perdigões, Santa Vitória, Outeiro Alto 2, Xancra or Bela Vista 5 (see issues in the lateral bar).

These perspectives and analysis have now also been developed for a ditched enclosure in Central Iberia. At Camino de las Yeseras a NE gate seems to be orientated to the Summer solstice at sunrise, and the sections of the ditches that define that entrance show evidences of intentional depositions interpreted as foundation rituals (Liesau et al., 2013-2014).

Something that will become more frequent, once we have access to more complete plans of enclosures and have in mind that architecture tends to be holistic

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Bibliographic Referece:

Liesau, C.; Vega, J., Daza, A.,  Rios, P., Menduiña, R., Blasco, C. (2013-2014), Manifestaciones simbólicas en el acceso Noreste del Recinto 4 de Foso en Camino de las Yeseras (San Fernando de Henares, Madrid), SALDVIE, 13-14: 53-69. 

Valera, A.C., (2008), “Mapeando o Cosmos. Uma abordagem cognitiva aos recintos da Pré-História Recente”, Era Arqueologia, 8, Lisboa, p.112-127.

Valera, A.C. e Becker, H. (2011), “Cosmologia e recintos de fossos da Pré-História Recente: resultados da prospecção geofísica em Xancra (Cuba, Beja)”, Apontamentos de Arqueologia e Património, 7, Lisboa, NIA-ERA Arqueologia, p.23-32

Valera, António Carlos (2013), “Breve apontamento sobre a dimensão cosmogónica dos recintos de fossos da Pré-História Recente no Interior Alentejano”, Cadernos do Endovélico, Nº1, Colibri/CMA, p.51-63