The Composition of the São Brás Copper Hoard in Relation to the Bell Beaker Metallurgy in the South-western Iberian Peninsula

A large ceramic vessel was discovered at São Brás (southern Portugal) containing a metallic hoard from the Chalcolithic/Early Bronze Age period. These weapons and tools were characterized by microanalytical techniques as being composed of copper with varying arsenic contents (2.2± 1.6 wt%) and minor amounts of lead, bismuth and iron. The collection shows a clear association between daggers and copper with a higher arsenic content, which can be explained by the high status of these silvery alloys. Finally, the compositional distribution of the hoard was compared with the metallurgy of the Bell Beaker and non–Bell Beaker communities inhabiting the south-western Iberian Peninsula.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

The Beaker phenomenon and the genomic transformation of northwest Europe

From around 2750 to 2500 bc, Bell Beaker pottery became widespread across western and central Europe, before it disappeared between 2200 and 1800 bc. The forces that propelled its expansion are a matter of long-standing debate, and there is support for both cultural diffusion and migration having a role in this process. Here we present genome-wide data from 400 Neolithic, Copper Age and Bronze Age Europeans, including 226 individuals associated with Beaker-complex artefacts. We detected limited genetic affinity between Beaker-complex-associated individuals from Iberia and central Europe, and thus exclude migration as an important mechanism of spread between these two regions. However, migration had a key role in the further dissemination of the Beaker complex. We document this phenomenon most clearly in Britain, where the spread of the Beaker complex introduced high levels of steppe-related ancestry and was associated with the replacement of approximately 90% of Britain’s gene pool within a few hundred years, continuing the east-to-west expansion that had brought steppe-related ancestry into central and northern Europe over the previous centuries

A paleoenvironmental perspective of prehistoric salt exploitation in the Villafáfila wetlands (Tierra de Campos, Zamora)

RESUMEN: La explotación de la sal en el complejo lagunar de Villafáfila (Tierra de Campos, Zamora) es uno de los eventos más importantes de la meseta norte de la península ibérica desde la Prehistoria. La producción de sal se documenta a partir del periodo Campaniforme (ca. 2450 cal BC). En 2013, se efectuó un sondeo mecánico en los pastizales húmedos anexos a la Laguna de las Salinas. El análisis de polen y microfósiles no polínicos de este registro sugiere el origen de la laguna hace al menos ocho mil años vinculado al evento climático 8,2 ka cal BP, un ambiente muy antropizado desde los inicios del Calcolítico ca. 3300 cal BC y la posterior explotación de la sal, la degradación paulatina y definitiva del bosque de encinas a partir de la Edad del Bronce, y, en general, una amplia variabilidad climática alternando fases húmedas y áridas a lo largo de toda la secuencia paleoambiental.ABSTRATC: Salt exploitation in the Villafáfila lagoon complex (Tierra de Campos, Zamora) is one of the most important events since Prehistory in the northern plateau of the Iberian Peninsula. Salt production is documented from the Bell Beaker (ca. 2450 cal BC). In 2013, a core drilling was performed in the salty swamp of the Laguna de las Salinas. The analysis of pollen and non-pollen palynomorphs of this record suggests the origin of the lagoon eight thousand years ago linked to the 8,2 ky cal BP climatic event, a very anthropized environment from the beginning of the Chalcolithic period ca. 3300 cal BC and the subsequent exploitation of salt, the gradual and definitive degradation of the holm oak forest from the Bronze Age onwards, and, in general, a wide climatic variability, with alternate humid and arid phases throughout the palaeoenvi-ronmental sequence.Éste trabajo ha sido financiado por una ayuda de investigación concedida al primer autor por la Consejería de Cultura y Turismo de la Junta de Castilla y León en 2013 para el Estudio arqueobotánico y paleoambiental del entorno de las lagunas de Villafáfila; y parcialmente por el Proyecto HAR2013-43701-P del Plan Nacional I+D+I del Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad

The genomic history of the Iberian Peninsula over the past 8000 years

Ancient DNA studies have begun to help us understand the genetic history and movements of people across the globe. Focusing on the Iberian Peninsula, Olalde et al. report genome-wide data from 271 ancient individuals from Iberia (see the Perspective by Vander Linden). The findings provide a comprehensive genetic time transect of the region. Linguistics analysis and genetic analysis of archaeological human remains dating from about 7000 years ago to the present elucidate the genetic impact of prehistoric and historic migrations from Europe and North Africa.Science, this issue p. 1230; see also p. 1153We assembled genome-wide data from 271 ancient Iberians, of whom 176 are from the largely unsampled period after 2000 BCE, thereby providing a high-resolution time transect of the Iberian Peninsula. We document high genetic substructure between northwestern and southeastern hunter-gatherers before the spread of farming. We reveal sporadic contacts between Iberia and North Africa by ~2500 BCE and, by ~2000 BCE, the replacement of 40% of Iberia’}s ancestry and nearly 100% of its Y-chromosomes by people with Steppe ancestry. We show that, in the Iron Age, Steppe ancestry had spread not only into Indo-European{–}speaking regions but also into non-Indo-European{–speaking ones, and we reveal that present-day Basques are best described as a typical Iron Age population without the admixture events that later affected the rest of Iberia. Additionally, we document how, beginning at least in the Roman period, the ancestry of the peninsula was transformed by gene flow from North Africa and the eastern Mediterranean

Seven Millennia of Saltmaking. III Congreso Internacional de Antropologia de la Sal

International audienc