El Argar
Archaeological site located in the municipality of Antas, Almería. It is the prehistoric settlement of the Bronze Age of the Iberian southeast that gives its name to the Argaric culture.
El Argar is considered a newly founded settlement, with no Chalcolithic antecedents. With an area of 16,000 square meters, and an estimated population of about 500 inhabitants, it is one of the largest known villages belonging to the eponymous group. More than a thousand graves have been found inside the dwellings themselves.
It was initially excavated by Rogelio de Inchaurrandieta, then by the brothers Enrique and Luis Siret who published their results in Spanish under the title “Las primeras edades del metal en el sudeste de España” in 1890.
Grave goods
El Argar is considered a newly founded settlement, with no Chalcolithic antecedents. With an area of 16,000 square meters, and an estimated population of about 500 inhabitants, it is one of the largest known villages belonging to the eponymous group. More than a thousand graves have been found inside the dwellings themselves.
It was initially excavated by Rogelio de Inchaurrandieta, then by the brothers Enrique and Luis Siret who published their results in Spanish under the title “Las primeras edades del metal en el sudeste de España” in 1890.
Grave goods
The first phase of occupation of the settlement reflects a peasant community, self-sufficient, that was initiated in metallurgy and was buried predominantly in pits, with very similar grave goods. In a second phase, there was a significant increase in the demography and metallurgical activities, mostly buried in cists, with already differentiated grave goods (they appear in some earrings and metal rings). In the third, there were clear socio-economic differences between the inhabitants of the settlement and ceramic urns predominated, in whose richer grave goods there are diadems, swords (elements of high ideological content), while many burials lack any type of offering.
The Argaric society disappeared around 1500 BC.
Skull, found in one of the tombs and drawn by the Siret brothers.
