Long-distance contacts in Northwestern Iberia during the IIIrd Millennium BC

Abstract

Due to its peripheral situation, north-western Iberia has been traditionally contemplated as a territory that was relatively isolated from the long-distance trade routes that would have existed across the Peninsula during late prehistory. Furthermore, if these contacts took place, they have been considered to be restricted to the closer territories, such as the north of the Duero River or the western part of the Cantabrian Rim and the Spanish Meseta. Likewise, many authors have repeatedly mentioned the possibility of sea contacts between the north-west and other territories of the European Atlantic coast. Nevertheless, these contacts have hardly ever been proved with any certainty. Now, technical similitudes and petrographic analysis have allowed us to confirm the presence of a blade made from Turón flint (Málaga, Andalusia) within the grave goods deposited in the Chan de Armada I mound (Pontevedra, Galicia). This circumstance provides a basis to revise other possible evidences of long-distance contacts that existed in the north-west and also their possible precedents in former millennia.