New data concerning “large blades” in Catalonia: Apt-Forcalquier chert in the Penedès (south of Barcelona) during the Late Neolithic - Chalcolithic
Keywords:
large blades”, Apt-Forcalquier chert, ancient trade, lithic technology, grave goods, Neolithic-Chalcolithic, North-eastern Iberia
Abstract
The study of large chert blades documented in funerary contexts from the Late Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age in the north-eastern part of Iberia has been addressed in recent works by the authors, in which 49 burial sites have been registered with more than 200 large chert blades. In this paper the recent data obtained from the study of seven archaeological sites located in the region of the Penedès (southwest of Barcelona) is presented.
The macroscopic characterization of the knapped stone industries shows their great variety regarding the origin of the siliceous raw material, often coming from outside the analysed region. In some cases their macroscopic features link them to Apt-Forcalquier chert (Haut Provence, France), which was widely distributed in the form of large blades during these phases of Late Catalan prehistory.
The absence of evidence of the chaîne opératoire production of this type of foreign chert in the lithic assemblages in Catalonia lead to the supposition that the dispersion of the blades was done as trade items, and only in a few cases were highly complex technological tools of this kind of raw material distributed (e.g., daggers). Use-wear analysis reveals that these blades were not merely luxury items in grave goods. Far from this idea, they have to be considered as functional, even multifunctional, items. All the same, it is thought that they must have had an important value because they moved from the domestic sphere to the graves. In fact, the pieces that usually remain are not small fragments, but whole or almost whole, large blades that normally remain effective.
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Gibaja, J.F., Palomo, A., Terradas, X., Clop, X. 2004, Útiles de siega en contextos funerarios del 3500-1500 cal ANE en el noreste de la Península Ibérica: El caso de las grandes láminas de sílex, Cypsela, 15: 187-195. (in Spanish) (“Harvest tools in burial contexts 3500-1500 cal BCE in north-eastern Iberia: The case of large blades”)
URL: http://www.raco.cat/index.php/Cypsela/article/view/175772/
Gibaja, J.F., Terradas, X., Palomo, A., Clop, X. 2009, Las grandes láminas de sílex en contextos funerarios del Neolítico final-Bronce inicial en el nordeste peninsular. In: Europa al final de la Prehistòria. Les grans fulles de sílex (Juan Francisco Gibaja, Xavier Terradas, Antoni Palomo, Xavier Clop, Eds.), Monografies Vol. 13. Museu d’Arqueologia de Catalunya, Barcelona: p. 63-73. (in Spanish) (“The large blades in burial contexts from Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age in northeastern Iberia”)
Juan-Cabanilles, J. 2008, El utillaje de piedra tallada en la Prehistoria reciente valenciana. Aspectos tipológicos, estilísticos y evolutivos. Serie de Trabajos Varios Vol. 109. Diputación de Valencia, Valencia, 300 p. (in Spanish) (“Knapped stone tools in the late prehistory of Valencia. Typological, stylistic and evolutionary aspects”)
Oms, F.X., Cebrià, A., Mestres, J., Morales, J.I., Pedro, M., Vergès, J.M. 2016. Campaniforme i metal•lúrgia en un espai sepulcral del III mil•lenni cal. BC: La Cova de la Guineu (Font Rubí, Alt Penedès). In: Jornades d’Arqueologia del Penedès (Esteve, X., Miró, C., Molist, N. & Sabaté, G., Eds), Institut d’Estudis Penedesencs, Vilafranca del Penedès: p. 109-116. (in Catalan) (“Bell beaker and metallurgy in a burial context of the 3rd millennium cal. BC: La Cova de la Guineu (Font Rubí, Alt Penedès))”
Plisson, H., Bressy, C., Briois, F., Renault, S. 2006, Les productions laminaires remarquables du midi de la France à la fin du Néolithique: les bases d’un programme collectif de recherche. In: Actes de la Table Ronde de l’EHESS. La fin de l’Âge de Pierre en Europe du Sud (Vaquer, J. & Briois, F., Eds), Archives d’Écologie Préhistorique, Toulouse: p. 71-81. (in French) (“The remarkable laminar productions of the south of France at the end of the Neolithic period: The basis of a collective research program”)
Reimer, P. J., Bard, E., Bayliss, A., Beck, J. W., Blackwell, P. G., Bronk Ramsey, C., Buck, C. E., Cheng, H., Edwards, R. L., Friedrich, M., Grootes, P. M., Guilderson, T. P.; Haflidason, H.; Hajdas, I.; Hatté, C.; Heaton, T. J.; Hoffmann, D. L.; Hogg, A. G.; Hughen, K. A., Kaiser, K. F., Kromer, B., Manning, S. W., Niu, M., Reimer, R. W., Richards, D. A., Scott, E. M., Southon, J. R., Staff, R. A., Turney, C. S. M. y van der Plicht, J. 2013, IntCal13 and Marine13 radiocarbon age calibration curves 0-50,000 years cal BP. Radiocarbon 55 (4): 1869-1887. doi:10.2458/azu_js_rc.55.16947
Terradas, X., Palomo, A., Clop, X., Gibaja, J.F. 2005, Primeros resultados sobre el estudio de grandes láminas procedentes de contextos funerarios del noreste de la Península Ibérica. In: Actas del III Congreso del Neolítico en la Península Ibérica (Arias Cabal, P., Ontañon Peredo, R., García-Moncó Piñeiro, C., Eds.), Monografías del Instituto Internacional de Investigaciones Prehistóricas de Cantabria, Vol.1, Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Cantabria, Santander: p. 349-375. (in Spanish) (“First results regarding the study of large blades provided by burial contexts in north-eastern Iberia”)
Terradas, X., Gibaja, J. F., Palomo, A. 2012, Producing for the dead, using while alive: lithic tools production and consumption in the Late Neolithic of North-Eastern Iberia. In: Social, Economic and Symbolic Perspectives at the Dawn of Metal Production (Conati Barbaro, C. & Lemorini, C., Eds.), BAR International Series Vol. 2372, Archaeopress, Oxford: p. 41-51.
Vaquer, J. 1990, Le Néolithique en Languedoc Occidental. Éditions Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris, 397 p. (in French) (“The Neolithic in western Languedoc”)
Vaquer, J. 2012, Réflexions sur échanges de biens matériels lithiques entre le Midi de la France et le nord de la Péninsule Ibérique au Néolithique et au Chalcolithique”. In: Actes del Congrés Internacional Xarxes al Neolític - Neolithic Network (Borrell, M., Borrell, F., Bosch, J., Clop, X. & Molist, M., Eds.), Rubricatum Vol. 5, Museu de Gavà, Gavà: p. 565-574. (in French) (“Reflections on the exchange of lithic material goods between the south of France and the north of the Iberian Peninsula in the Neolithic and Chalcolithic”)
Vaquer J. & Briois F. (Eds.) 2006, La fin de l’Age de pierre en Europe du sud. Matériaux et productions lithiques taillées remarquables dans le Néolithique et le Chalcolithique du sud de l’Europe. Edition des Archives d’Ecologie Préhistorique. Toulouse, 284 p. (in French) (“The end of the Stone Age in southern Europe. Materials and remarkable lithic knapped productions during the Neolithic and the Chalcolithic in the south of Europe”)
Vaquer J., Martin Colliga A., Juan Cabanilles J., Bordreuil M., Galant Ph. 2014, Les poignards à retouches parallèles couvrantes sur préformes polies en silex de Forcalquier dans la zone nord-occidentale de la Méditerranée. In: Entre archéologie et écologie, une préhistoire de tous les milieux: Mélanges offerts à Pierre Pétrequin (Arbogast, R.-M. & Greffier Richard, A., Eds.) Annales Littéraires de l'Université de Franche Comté. Série Environnement, Société et Archéologie, Vol. 18, Presses Universitaires de Franche Comté, Besançon: p. 129-155 (in French) (“Parallel-flaked daggers made from polished preforms in Forcalquier flint from the northwest Mediterranean region”)
Published
15-Sep-2016
How to Cite
Mangado Llach, J., Vaquer, J., Gibaja Bao, J. F., Oms Arias, F. X., Cebrià Escuer, A., González Olivares, C. B., Martín Colliga, A., & Marín, D. (2016). New data concerning “large blades” in Catalonia: Apt-Forcalquier chert in the Penedès (south of Barcelona) during the Late Neolithic - Chalcolithic. Journal of Lithic Studies, 3(2), 481-496. https://doi.org/10.2218/jls.v3i2.1833
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Section
ISKM 2015 - Barcelona - Research Articles
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