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O Barranco do Farinheiro e a presença campaniforme na margem esquerda do baixo Tejo
Abstract
Identified during the survey works conducted under the project ANSOR – Anthropization of the Sorraia Valley, the archaeological site of Barranco do Farinheiro corresponds to three different Chalcolithic occupation areas (loci 1 to 3) located on the edge of Miocene escarpment overhanging to the alluvial plain of the Sorraia River, few kilometers east from the chalcolithic site of Cabeço do Pé da Erra. So far, the excavation works were focused exclusively on Barranco do Farinheiro 2, affected by erosion processes possibly motivated by sand extraction. Despite the small excavated area (36 m2), a negative feature was identified herein. It corresponds to a ditch arranged in two levels with distinct altimetry, filled with an interesting sedimentation sequence. Two moments of occupation/ use are discernible: a first one, possibly integrated in the first half of the 3rd millennium BCE; a second, datable already of its second half. Both of these occupation/ use episodes are separated by a sterile stratigraphic level corresponding to deposits derived from the disaggregation of the ditch walls – which allows distinguishing these two phases, separated by an occupation hiatus. These two episodes are also distinguishable by the presence of a set of decorated pottery in the upper levels, absent in the lower levels of the ditch colmatation sequence. This set includes sherds with the typical printed decoration of the «acacia-leaf» group and bell beaker ceramics (plain and decorated), stratigraphically associable. This last occupation took place when the ditch was already half filled; the deposition of vessels along its West wall, as well as the deposition of loom weights on a pit (about 200 fragments, corresponding exclusively to the crescent type), was performed during this latter phase. Based on the data collected in Barranco do Farinheiro 2, the authors rehearse a preliminary attempt to characterize the beaker occupation on the left bank of the lower Tagus River, showing that the scarcity of sites therein identified (in opposition to the intense occupation known on the right bank) could be probably explained by archaeographic contingencies, not exactly by a lack of effective use of the territory.
During the 3rd millennium B.C., the communities that occupied the archaeological site of Vila Nova de São Pedro (Azambuja) witnessed a period of remarkable alterations and changes, punctuated by the intensification and diversification of socioeconomic systems. One of the aspects of this economic diversification is centered on the exploitation and consumption of “secondary products”, visible through the archaeological record, be it through faunal studies, as well as specific artefactual categories such as the so called “cheese strainers”. These vessels, whose functional characteristics indicate a use related to the processing of dairy
products, are considered a “type-fossils” of the 3rd millennium B.C in the Portuguese Estremadura, being identified in numerous settlements. In Vila Nova de São Pedro a large quantity of cheese strainer fragments was collected, coming either from the excavations directed by Afonso do Paço, or from within the scope of the VNSP3000 project.
This paper will present the main results of the morphological and technological analysis of this collection, allowing a systematic approach to this artefactual category.
O consumo de laticínios e de derivados lácteos de origem animal constituem importantes marcos na (pré)história humana. Estes hábitos, entretanto, podem ser elusivos, sendo esta uma ação relativamente difícil de identificar no registo arqueológico. Durante o presente século a nossa compreensão da génese e desenvolvimento da exploração e consumo de laticínios vem sendo alterada. Percebemos hoje que o tradicional modelo da “revolução dos produtos secundários” de Andrew Sherratt não sucede exatamente como esperado. Através de metodologias biogeoquímicas de análise sabemos que em grande parte da Eurásia, incluindo a Península Ibérica, o consumo de laticínios acompanha o processo de neolitização. Com isto, mesmo que ainda baseados em análises esporádicas, ficamos a saber que esta seria uma atividade presente desde os primeiros contextos do Neolítico Antigo em Portugal, mesmo que em proporções relativamente baixas em comparação com outras áreas da Europa. Sendo assim, apresentamos algumas metodologias de identificação assim como evidências do consumo e processamento de laticínios em Portugal a partir dos escassos dados dos quais dispomos, nomeadamente através da zooarqueologia, análises químicas pontuais, e uma categoria artefactual específica – “queijeiras”.
The Portuguese Estremadura has a high density in beaker sites and finds, and is clearly one of the keys areas for the understanding of the birth and spreading of the beaker phenomenon. However, due to a large number of early excavations which do not provide adequate stratigraphic context, the quality of the information available is somewhat uneven. The known data seems to support an unequal presence of bell beaker pottery throughout a single territory. Therefore, it seems important to understand the beaker phenomenon from a territorial standpoint thus avoiding the potentially reductive studies which focus on large settlements or in exceptional necropolises. This article is centered on a study-area naturally defined by the river basin of the Ribeira de Cheleiros, which is part of the modern councils of Mafra and Sintra. The research projects and rescue archaeology which have taken place in this region over the last decades have resulted in a major corpus of information which includes sites with bell beaker potter, 11 with excavations. The analysis will include a generic distribution of the several bell beaker styles (maritime, dotted and incised) in the territory. The asymmetrical distribution of these wares in several sites will also be addressed, most relevantly in the case of the near absence of beaker wares in the fortified settlement of Penedo do Lexim and their presence in opens sites such as Casal Cordeiro 5. A proposal for the various stages of dissemination of beaker pottery this territory will also be presented, which might be an important case study for understanding the beaker phenomenon in the Lisbon Peninsula.
The prehistoric site of Sobral do Martim Afonso (Muge, Salvaterra de Magos, Portugal): a curious Late Neolithic/Chalcolithic context on the left bank of Lower Tagus River.
Known since the late 19th century and assumed as a burial place due to the finding of some artefacts and objects typical of that kind of contexts, the prehistoric site of Sobral do Martim Afonso offers a series of questions regarding the study of the Late Neolithic/Chalcolithic communities in the Southwestern Iberian Peninsula. One can highlight: 1) the apparent coincidence between a settlement and a burial site, gathering in the same place the spaces for the living and the spaces for the dead; 2) the «culturally megalithic» features of the funerary context thereby identified, on an area in which there are no known megalithic monuments and where they could not have virtually existed, due to the actual absence of capable constructive supports in the local geological substratum; 3) its geographical position, in the transition area between Alentejo and the Lisbon Peninsula. This paper intends to present new interpretative readings about this archaeological site, regarding its possible specific functionality and according to the currently available data.
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