Late Atlantic Settlement in Southern Portugal - Results of an excavation of a Mesolithic shell midden by the River Sado

Lars Larsson

doi:10.37718/csa.1996.08

Abstract

The study of large settlement sites with graves from the Late Mesolithic has changed our conception of this period. In western Europe this kind of antiquity has long been known, and it is well represented in the coastal area of western Iberia. One settlement site —Popas de Sao Bento, near the River Sado in southern Portugal — has recently been excavated as part of a joint Swedish-Portuguese project. The results of the excavation give interesting perspectives on specific and general conditions in a broader geographical, chronological, and social context.

Highlights

The excavations of the Late Mesolithic settlement around an ancient lagoon at Skateholm in southern Scania helped to qualify our perception of the Late Mesolithic in a concrete way
The Late Mesolithic was perceived almost without reservation as a period of complex social structures (Price 1985), which were regarded in many cases as being equivalent in some respects to the contemporaneous Early Neolithic societies on the Continent
In the latter section there is a group of shell middens which appear today to be inland sites, since they are about 30 km upstream from the estuary (Fig. 1)

Summary

Lars Larsson

The study of large settlement sites with graves from the Late Mesolithic has changed our conception of this period. The Late Mesolithic was perceived almost without reservation as a period of complex social structures (Price 1985), which were regarded in many cases as being equivalent in some respects to the contemporaneous Early Neolithic societies on the Continent. A study of settlement and burial in a western European perspective ought to incorporate the previously excavated cemeteries from the Late Mesolithic, such as those at Hoedic and Téviec on islands south of Brittany (Pequart, Pequart, Boule 8c Vallois 1937; Pequart & Pequart 1954) and several sites in presentday Portugal (Roche 1972, 1989;Lubell et al 1989). In the latter section there is a group of shell middens which appear today to be inland sites, since they are about 30 km upstream from the estuary (Fig. 1)

The higher level of the oceans in Late

Casa de Muora

When trying to understand the settlement