Knapping methods and techniques in the bracelets quarry of Cortijo Cevico (Loja, Granada) (original) (raw)
Related papers
Shaping Marble, Shaping Minds: Apprenticeship in an Early Neolithic Bracelet Quarry
Lithic Technology, 2019
Stone bracelets are one of the most outstanding aspects of personal ornamentation of the Early Neolithic in the south of the Iberian Peninsula (5500-4800 cal. BC). These ornaments are an element of cultural identity and a chronological marker of the first Neolithic societies in this area. Discovery and study of the Neolithic quarry of Cortijo Cevico (Loja, Granada) has allowed us to identify the extraction and initial reduction of dolomitic marble for the manufacture of bracelets. The archaeological assemblage from the quarry comprises knapping waste, circular roughouts (from which bracelets were manufactured), and the tools used in these activities. In this paper, we evaluate the evidence for apprenticeship processes in the quarry. We use different methodological resources to demonstrate that knowledge transmission occurred in the quarry including experimental knapping by experienced and novice knappers, ethnographic examples, and the application of diacritical schemes to the abandoned archaeological roughouts.
One of the most characteristic personal ornament of the European Neolithic is the ring bracelet made of stone or shell. In Italy, its spreading affected several cultural groups between the Early and Middle Neolithic. It was a very common adornment object, especially in the northern Italian regions, indicating that its employment was trans-cultural and had a long lasting tradition during the Neolithic. The paper focuses on the stone bracelets of the Early Neolithic groups of northern Italy dated between 5600 and 4900/4800 cal. BC, taking into consideration their geographical distribution, the raw materials employed, the manufacturing processes, the exchange networks and interrelation between different groups.
L’art du paraître: apparences de l’humain, de la Préhistoire à nos jours. The art of human appearence, from Prehistory to the present day. 40e rencontres internationales d’archéologie et d’histoire de Nice Côte d’Azur. H. Alarashi and R.M. Dessi (dirs.), 2020
The subterranean mines of Gavà were among the main sources of variscite exploited and distributed in the West Mediterranean basin during the Middle Neolithic (1st half of the 4th millennium BC). The recent excavations of three mines (83, 84 and 85) at the Ferreres sector shed new light not only on the economic aspects, but also on an unknown ritual and symbolic practices carried out in the mines. This study presents the results of the technological, morphometrical and stylistic analyses of the variscite assemblage of beads and unfinished items and blanks discovered in mines 83 and 85. It confirms the existence of two different types of production, one of them being conventional, standardized, characteristic of specialized crafts and destined for external exchange, while the other is more “experimental” and expedient. These qualities are discussed within the chrono- cultural context of the region, but also consider the exceptional mining and beadmaking context at Gavà. The results also consider the anthropological data regarding the buried individuals in these mines, identified as the miners and beadmakers, through questioning their roles and influence in the construction and consolidation of the identity of the Sepulcros de Fosa (Pit Burial culture) communities in the North East of the Iberian Peninsula and more largely in the Western Mediterranean basin.
A very early "fashion": Neolithic stone bracelets from a Mediterranean perspective
Open Archaeology, 2021
Ring-shaped objects, used mainly as bracelets, appear in the archaeological record associated with the first farming societies around the Mediterranean area. These bracelets, among other personal ornaments, are related to the spread of the farming economy in the Mediterranean (10th-6th millennium BC). In particular, stone bracelets, given their intricate technology, are linked with the early stages of craft specialization and the beginnings of complex social organization. Likewise, their frequency in Early Neolithic assemblages and the lithologies in which they were made have become an important element in the study of the circulation networks of goods, as well as the symbolic behaviors and aesthetic preferences of the first farming groups. This research provides the first overview of the stone bracelets of Neolithic groups in the Mediterranean. We compare the similarities and differences among these ornaments in different geographical zones across the region including Turkey, Greece, Italy, and Spain. Using all the information available about these ornaments chronology, typology, raw materials and manufacturing processes, use-wear, repair, and alteration practices we shed light on a complex archaeological transcultural manifestation related to the spread of the Neolithic lifestyle across the European continent.
Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 2022
The onset and development of the Neolithisation process in the northeast of the Iberian Peninsula have been determined by the division between the Cardial and Epicardial chrono-cultural horizons based on the characteristic traits of the ceramic productions. The investigations about these productions have been fundamentally focused on their formal and decorative features, while other research dealing with their production and use have just recently emerged in the last years. This paper focuses on the reconstruction of the forming technologies that were used for manufacturing the Early Neolithic vessels from Cova del Frare (Barcelona, NE Iberian Peninsula) assigned to the Cardial and Epicardial styles. The analysis and systematisation of manufacturing traces reveal that both ceramic wares were produced with the same forming practices, regardless of their decorative techniques: the use of circular juxtaposed patches and the assembly of coils. The evidence of these pot-forming processes, which prevailed during the Early Neolithic occupations of this cave (5217-4796 cal. BCE), provides the first empirical data of the forming practices that were used by the first communities of farmers in NE Iberia. Furthermore, these results enable us to include this area in the discussions on the distribution of these technical traditions and practices during the Early Neolithic in the Western Mediterranean.
This work presents a review of current research lines, new discoveries and discussion points about Late Mesolithic and Early Neolithic art in Eastern Spain. First, we will review the post- Palaeolithic sequence to give an account of recent advances in chronology and interpretative changes in cultural affiliation of some styles. Then, we will focus on the main spatio-temporal patterns of stylistic variation at the macro-regional scale. Such a perspective is more suitable for analysing the relationship between social contexts of art production with the underlying mechanisms of the neolithisation process (spread of farming, cultural interaction between foragers and farmers, ethnicity and social networks among different Neolithic groups). We will argue that the Neolithic transition in the study area involved an abrupt change in artistic traditions and belief systems. For this presentation, we provide an updated overview of the post-Palaeolithic artistic sequence as an empirical framework for further discussions about the neolithization process in Eastern Spain. The Iberian Mediterranean region harbours one of the richest post-Palaeolithic rock art records of Southern Europe. The current data is irregularly distributed over the archaeological sequence. During the Late Mesolithic (of Castelnovian tradition), the art record is fragmentary, quantitatively meaningless and geographically sparse. Technically, it consists of linear and geometric (non figurative) motifs engraved on small slabs. To date, no parietal evidence has been definitely attributed to this chronological horizon. On the basis of technical and graphic conceptions, no phylogenetic relationships can be established regarding the engraved Upper Magdalenian or Early Epipaleolithic parietal and mobile art. In contrast, the record of figurative and geometric representations on both rock and portable art dated to the Early Neolithic is overwhelmingly higher and varied. It encompasses different rock art styles with figurative and geometric motifs, also represented in ceramic wares found in archaeological contexts. Three main styles are dated at the Neolithic period: the Macroschematic, the Schematic and the Levantine rock art. The Macroschematic art is geographically restricted to the central region of Mediterranean Spain. Its distribution is delimited by the settlement territory of the earliest Cardial Neolithic sites. It mainly consists of large representations of individual or double anthropomorphic figures with upraised arms, series of parallel curved lines and zigzags and other schematic motifs interpreted as human, vegetation or bull representations. This imagery reflects a strong symbolic and religious component, closely connected with iconographic concepts identified in the material culture of other Mediterranean Neolithic cultures. The Schematic rock art displays a wider geographical distribution and more extended chronology, from the Early Neolithic through the Bronze Age. Schematic motifs include very simplistic representations of anthropomorphic and zoomorphic figures (sheep, deer) and other geometric ones such as bars, broken lines, triangles, suns or dots created with digital imprints. Recent studies on rock art and material culture have allowed the identification of an iconographic body of Early Neolithic representations, which displays formal and conceptual similarities with the Macroschematic art. In fact, motifs of both styles are well documented on Early Neolithic ceramic decorations during the Cardial and Epicardial phases. A noticeable variability in rock art sites in terms of motifs, location patterns, number of representations and composition complexity suggest different social contexts of production and use. Finally, the Levantine style is characterized by figurative and naturalistic representations of animals and human figures often in scenes with a clear narrative sense (animalistic scenes, individual and collective hunting events, social aggregations and warfare confrontations). It is widely distributed along the Mediterranean regions of the Iberian Peninsula except for Central and Northern Catalonia. Stylistic variability within the Levantine rock art gives account of both regional variations and chronological differences also reflected in technical and composition conceptions. From a regional perspective, it suggests the emergence of intergroup identity processes that operated at different geographic scales. The chronology and cultural affiliation of the Levantine rock art has been deeply discussed during last decades. Chromatic stratigraphy, by means of superimposition of Levantine figures to Macroschematic and Early Schematic motifs, clearly indicates a Neolithic chronology. Previously accepted, Levantine mobiliar evidences on impressed ceramics have been recently discarded and attributed to the Schematic style. In addition, the representation of some objects associated with Levantine human figures, such as bracelets, some specific types of geometric microliths (crescents or long trapezes) and bifacial arrow points argues for a Neolithic chronology as well, encompassing more advanced archaeological phases (Middle Neolithic, Late Neolithic and Eneolithic). Recently, the relative chronology based on radiocarbon dating on oxalate crusts brackets the production of Levantine figures between the 6th and the 2nd millennium cal. BC.