A new roman fish-salting workshop in the Saltés Island (Tinto-Odiel Estuary, SW Spain): La Cascajera and its archaeological and geological context

Abstract

The southwestern Atlantic coast of the Iberian Peninsula presents an important Roman heritage that includes numerous fish-salting workshops, with an industrial activity that went on for almost a millennium (1st century BC-7th century AD). Nevertheless, a future broad research is still necessary to determine the geologic substratum on which they are based, their palaeoenvironmental evolution, their main economic objectives and the byproducts derived from their activities. This paper is focused on the geology, dating and the archaeological record of La Cascajera, a new site located in the Tinto-Odiel estuary (SW Spain). This new cetaria occupied the northwestern end of La Cascajera ridge (Saltés Island), constituted by sandy, bioclastic deposits of previous washover fans (1st-2th centuries AD). During the main period of activity (middle of 4th century AD-5th century AD), the existence of a certain typology of amphorae as well as the documentation of a shell deposit formed mostly by Glycymeris suggest that this factory was oriented to the production of mixed fish sauces and the handling of edible bivalves. The main features of this deposit (texture, paleontology, taphonomy) could be used to differentiate middens from natural shelly ridges.