With significant repercussion in the media, the recent confirmation of a timber circle in the centre of Perdigões enclosure is, in fact, a major finding in Iberian archaeology, namely in the context of enclosure phenomena. Right in the centre of the large ditched enclosure of Perdigões (that has 450m diameter) there is this 20m diameter timber circle with several concentric rows of palisades and post alignments, with an apparent entrance aligned with the summer solstice (in the third part that has been exposed so far). The external rows have been dated between 2800-2600 BC.
It is the
first monumental structure of this kind found in Iberia and its closest
parallels are in central Europe or in YK. Which brings immediately the question
of what does this find means: something unique or just a point of an
unsuspected iceberg?
Independently
of that, this structure confirms some earlier findings that indicate that in
Iberia there was also and important prehistoric architecture in wood (and not
just in stone and earth), some of them were already presented in this blog (see
Outeiro Alto 2 or Estácio 6). It also reaffirms the ceremonial status of
Perdigões enclosures and the significance of the centre of that natural amphitheatre,
that present a recurrent with ceremonial architectures and practices during the
3rd millennium BC.
A first partial interpretative proposal.
