Ivory in the Chalcolithic enclosure of Perdigões (South Portugal): the social role of an exotic raw material

Abstract

This article discusses the social role played by ivory and ivory articles in the Perdigões enclosures (South Portugal) during the Chalcolithic (third millennium bc), in the context of the emergence and development of social complexity on the Iberian Peninsula. Perdigões is a Portuguese prehistoric site with some of the highest concentrations of ivory objects known in Iberia and with the greatest variety. The contexts, almost exclusively funerary, are discussed along with the results of provenance studies. Comparing the different contexts and the categories of objects made of ivory makes it possible to distinguishing a variety of active social dimensions (such as individual status, group identity, ideological referents, social or political roles, ontological and cosmological perceptions) to these items which drew on the importance of exotic raw materials in the reformulation of social relations that was taking place specifically at this site and in Iberia in general.