Early Farming Communities in Thessaly: work in progress

Within the framework of our project, we are now in Thessaly at the Diachronic Museum of Larissa for analyzing the materials from various Early, Middle and Late Neolithic sites in order to explore the evolution of the harvesting technologies of the first farming communities of the Thessalian plain.

The entrance of the Diachronic Museum of Larissa

Thessalian plane shows an incredible density of this type of sites, over 300 sites have been surveyed, even if only a small percentage have been excavated. Few areas in Europe has such a density of Neolithic settlements.

One of the labels of the museum with the distribution of the surveyed (yellow dots) and excavated (red dots) Neolithic mounds.

Materials conserved in the Museum are of exceptional relevance for the understanding of the Neolithic diffusion process, with some beautiful examples of clay human figurines.

Some of the materials exposed in the Museum.

The city of Larissa also conserves some relevant monuments from Greek, Byzantine and Ottoman periods, mainly concentrated in the acropolis of the city.

The ancient theater of the city (first half of the 3rd century BC- early 4th century).

We would like to thanks G. Toufeix and C. Mpatzelas for their kindness and their support, C. Perlés for introducing us to Greek Neolithic, E. Alram-Stern for allowing participating in the study of Platia Magoula and L. Papagiannaki and C. Moser for their joyful company and help.

Work in progress...

  

The Sickles of Nerja Cave (Málaga, Spain)

This week we visited the "Cueva de Nerja" to study the first Neolithic sickles found in the "Mina" sector. Recent excavations are delivering superb results and an excellent contextualization of evidence.

The results obtained complete the information we currently have from the south of the Iberian Peninsula.

This work is inserted in the studies that are being carried out in the cave under the direction of José Luis Sanchidrián and Luis Efrén Fernández.

We thank them for their kindness and collaboration. As well as to Mari Angeles Medina, Cristina, Yolanda, Juan Bautista Salado and all the friends who work in the cave and the museum of Nerja.

New Paper: The Sickles of Egolzwil 3 (Switzerland)

We present a new paper published in Quaternary International.

Thank you all authors!!!!


The Neolithic reaping knives from Egolzwil 3: A Mediterranean technical tradition in the late 5th millennium Swiss Neolithic.

Working in Pamplona (Navarra): neolithic site of Cascajos

These days we went to Pamplona (Navarra) for studying the Neolithic materials of the Cascajos settlement. The results have been enormously interesting in relation to two different sickle types, which correspond to two differentiated chronological moments.

A previous work by Juan José Ibáñez and Jesus Emilio González, on a sample of these deposits, arrived at the same conclusions. Now we have reviewed all the material.

In order to get this study done, the collaboration of Juan José Ibáñez, Jesus Emilio González, Jesus Sesma, Jesus García Gazólaz, Cristina López and Manuel Rojo has been indispensable.
Millions of thanks to all the people involved.