Abstract
AbstractWe report an archeomagnetic study from the Early Iron Age archeological site of Cerro de San Vicente (Salamanca, Spain). The studied materials were sampled from one roundhouse and its central fireplace, a surrounding burnt floor, and slags with a twofold objective. First, to archeomagnetically determine the last use of the central fireplace, because dating with other methods was imprecise. Second, to retrieve information about the Earth's magnetic field in Western Europe from a period when the Levantine Iron Age Anomaly (LIAA) has been occasionally reported. This study includes mineralogical, archeomagnetic directional analyses, and multimethod archeointensity determinations. Paleomagnetic analyses of the central fireplace yield a mean direction: declination D = 15.1°, inclination I = 52.5°; k = 477.1, and α95 = 5.6°. Archeointensity determinations yield a mean anisotropy‐corrected archeointensity of 72.4 ± 2.0 μT (74.7 ± 4.3 μT if a pTRM‐check correction is applied) on the central fireplace and 48.2 ± 2.0 μT on slags. A full‐vector archeomagnetic dating was performed with the SHA.DIF.4k geomagnetic field model which yielded an age interval of last use of the central fireplace between 644 and 575 BCE (654–575 BCE with the pTRM‐check corrected data) at 95% confidence level. This date agrees with the archeological context. Results allows to place the high paleointensity obtained near the maximum observed in Iberia at this age, confirming the existence of this peak related to the LIAA in Western Europe where records of this feature are still scarce.
Highlights
Periods, such as the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age in southwestern Europe are very relevant in archeological research because they provide information to reconstruct social and economic changes during a key cultural transition interval (e.g., Gómez-Paccard et al, 2019; Goslar, 2019)
We report an archeomagnetic study from the Early Iron Age archeological site of Cerro de
Results allows to place the high paleointensity obtained near the maximum observed in Iberia at this age, confirming the existence of this peak related to the Levantine Iron Age Anomaly (LIAA) in Western Europe where records of this feature are still scarce
Summary
Periods, such as the Late Bronze Age (ca. 1,300–900 BCE) and Early Iron Age (ca. 900–400 BCE) in southwestern Europe are very relevant in archeological research because they provide information to reconstruct social and economic changes during a key cultural transition interval (e.g., Gómez-Paccard et al, 2019; Goslar, 2019). Combustion structures (e.g., kilns and hearths) and burnt archeological materials (e.g., conflagrated floors, pottery, or slags) are relatively frequent at these sites and represent an excellent opportunity to retrieve geomagnetic field information (under the proviso of an independent age control) and to perform archeomagnetic dating. 800–400 BCE) is problematic for this period as it gives rise to a large uncertainty in the date interval not lower than ∼400 yr (Hamilton et al, 2015; Hervé & Lanos, 2017). For this reason, further dating methods are necessary to tackle the Early Iron Age (900–400 BCE) chronology in Western Europe and archeomagnetism is a foremost choice for this period
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