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El poblado fortificado metalúrgico del Calcolítico Medio y final de Puente de Santa Bárbara (Huércal-Overa, Almería)

2018; Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca; Volume: 81; Linguagem: Inglês

10.14201/zephyrus2018817191

2386-3943

Pedro González Quintero, Alfredo Mederos Martín, A. Díaz Cantón, Charles Bashore Acero, Jorge Chamón Fernández, Marco Moreno-Benítez,

Archaeology and ancient environmental studies

The fortified chalcolithic settlement in Puente de Santa Bárbara (Huércal-Overa, Almería), with 1.5 ha, located 3 km away from the Cerro Minado copper mines, and exploited at least during the Late Chalcolithic, presents copper ores, crucible smelting and melting debris such as slags, casting prills, reduction vessels and crucibles. 4% of all the ceramic fragments correspond to reduction vessel and crucible fragments, spatially distributed in the three excavated sectors and suggest the generalization of the metallurgy within the habitat. The percentage of metallurgical evidences could only be compared in the southeast of the Iberian Peninsula to the Copper Age settlements of Parazuelos (Lorca, Murcia) and Agua Amarga (Lorca, Murcia), another minor site of 0.25 ha. These data suggest the hypothesis of small settlements specialized in the production of tools or small metallic ingots made in rectangular crucibles during the Late Chalcolithic in the Southeast of the Iberian Peninsula.