Raquel Vilaça
Raquel Vilaça graduated in History (pre-specialisation in Archaeology) (1981) from the Faculty of Letters of the University of Coimbra (FLUC) and was awarded her PhD by the same University (1995) with the thesis Aspectos do Povoamento da Beira Interior (Centro e Sul) nos Finais da Idade do Bronze, Trabalhos de Arqueologia, 9, IPPAR, Lisbon, a work which received the “Gulbenkian Prize for Archaeology” (1997). Her professional career started in 1982 at the University of Coimbra, where she has worked throughout her academic career on an exclusivity basis.
She teaches and supervises works in the Archaeology courses (BA, MA, and PhD), and has been the Director of the Master in Regional Archaeology and the PhD in Archaeology. She is a Member of the Institute of Archaeology, for which she served as Director, having also directed its journal, Conimbriga. She is also a researcher of the CEAACP/FCT – Centre for Studies in Archaeology, Arts and Heritage Sciences and the CEPBA – Centre for Prehistoric Studies of Beira Alta. She has occupied various management positions in her Faculty, among which that of President of the Pedagogic Council, and she is currently an elected member of the Scientific Council of FLUC and the Scientific Council of the Department for History, European Studies, Archaeology and Arts.
She coordinates or has coordinated scientific projects and participates or has participated as a researcher in several others, both national and international. Likewise, she is or has been a scientific consultant for various research and heritage projects. She is responsible for the excavation of more than 30 archaeological sites and countless survey works, leading teams with an active participation of students.
Her research is focused on Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology, and especially on the study of the Bronze and Iron Ages. Her interests also extend to Settlement Archaeology, Mediterranean Archaeology, the Archaeology of the Atlantic World, the Archaeology of Production, the Archaeology of Natural Places, Archaic Technology and Metallurgy, Archaeometry, Death Processes and Materialities, and Ritual, Cultic, and Symbolic Expressions, fields in which she has published books and papers, in Portugal and abroad. She has also presented her work in various scientific meetings, nationals and internationals, as well as in conferences, lectures and open classes in Universities, Academies, Research Centres, Museums, Schools, Town Halls and Cultural Associations.
She teaches and supervises works in the Archaeology courses (BA, MA, and PhD), and has been the Director of the Master in Regional Archaeology and the PhD in Archaeology. She is a Member of the Institute of Archaeology, for which she served as Director, having also directed its journal, Conimbriga. She is also a researcher of the CEAACP/FCT – Centre for Studies in Archaeology, Arts and Heritage Sciences and the CEPBA – Centre for Prehistoric Studies of Beira Alta. She has occupied various management positions in her Faculty, among which that of President of the Pedagogic Council, and she is currently an elected member of the Scientific Council of FLUC and the Scientific Council of the Department for History, European Studies, Archaeology and Arts.
She coordinates or has coordinated scientific projects and participates or has participated as a researcher in several others, both national and international. Likewise, she is or has been a scientific consultant for various research and heritage projects. She is responsible for the excavation of more than 30 archaeological sites and countless survey works, leading teams with an active participation of students.
Her research is focused on Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology, and especially on the study of the Bronze and Iron Ages. Her interests also extend to Settlement Archaeology, Mediterranean Archaeology, the Archaeology of the Atlantic World, the Archaeology of Production, the Archaeology of Natural Places, Archaic Technology and Metallurgy, Archaeometry, Death Processes and Materialities, and Ritual, Cultic, and Symbolic Expressions, fields in which she has published books and papers, in Portugal and abroad. She has also presented her work in various scientific meetings, nationals and internationals, as well as in conferences, lectures and open classes in Universities, Academies, Research Centres, Museums, Schools, Town Halls and Cultural Associations.
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Papers by Raquel Vilaça
Keywords: Rock art; prehistoric statuary; anthropomorphic representation; excavation; chronology.
Resumo
As estelas e estátuas-menir constituem alguns dos testemunhos mais intrigantes e desafiantes da arqueologia pré e proto-histórica da Península Ibérica. São raros os exemplares de estatuária pré-histórica encontrados num contexto arqueológico preservado, sendo as cronologias propostas baseadas na sua iconografia. Considerando a forte possibilidade da estátua-menir de Nave 1 estar in situ, esta apresentava uma oportunidade singular para investigar questões de ordem cronológica, tecnológica e contextual. O monumento foi escavado e parte da sua vala de fundação registada; amostras de C14 foram recolhidas de uma unidade estratigráfica cortada por esta vala e de uma fogueira próxima. A estratigrafia e o espólio são apresentados, ilustrados pelo registo gráfico da escavação. O protocolo de limpeza de líquenes da estátua-menir é apresentado. Após uma contextualização arqueológica, os dados obtidos são discutidos e as perspetivas de trabalho neste importante sítio arqueológico são apresentadas.
Palavras-chave: Arte rupestre; estatuária pré-histórica; representação antropomórfica; escavação; cronologia.
Keywords: Rock art; prehistoric statuary; anthropomorphic representation; excavation; chronology.
Resumo
As estelas e estátuas-menir constituem alguns dos testemunhos mais intrigantes e desafiantes da arqueologia pré e proto-histórica da Península Ibérica. São raros os exemplares de estatuária pré-histórica encontrados num contexto arqueológico preservado, sendo as cronologias propostas baseadas na sua iconografia. Considerando a forte possibilidade da estátua-menir de Nave 1 estar in situ, esta apresentava uma oportunidade singular para investigar questões de ordem cronológica, tecnológica e contextual. O monumento foi escavado e parte da sua vala de fundação registada; amostras de C14 foram recolhidas de uma unidade estratigráfica cortada por esta vala e de uma fogueira próxima. A estratigrafia e o espólio são apresentados, ilustrados pelo registo gráfico da escavação. O protocolo de limpeza de líquenes da estátua-menir é apresentado. Após uma contextualização arqueológica, os dados obtidos são discutidos e as perspetivas de trabalho neste importante sítio arqueológico são apresentadas.
Palavras-chave: Arte rupestre; estatuária pré-histórica; representação antropomórfica; escavação; cronologia.
on a flat axe from the county of Fundão are presented. The analytical data show that the artefact is a binary bronze alloy (Cu+Sn), which include the axe within a metallurgical tradition usually associated to
the Final Bronze Age.
The presentation and the discussion of the results allowed a review of the various findings from the territory of the county of Fundão, thereby enabling to provide a state of art about the ancient metallurgy of this region.
In this paper the author evaluates and discusses four unpublished pieces, reflecting about them in conjunction with the results of the latest research. The discussion focuses on the 1st millennium BC, but is
not confined to it, addressing specific materials, excavated sites and unexcavated ones (which, nonetheless, should be excavated). This allows addressing territories and pathways that, altogether, help understanding the social dynamics of a region full of encounters and confrontations.
e 2016 no interior do recinto fortificado medieval no Alto da Pena, em Vila do Touro (Sabugal), que regista
níveis de ocupação mais antigos, recuados ao I milénio a. C. Apesar das peças se encontrarem fragmentadas
e incompletas, as suas características morfológicas permitem atribuir-lhes uma cronologia em torno da I
Idade do Ferro e integrá-las no conjunto de artefactos normalmente conotados com o “mundo orientalizante”,
denunciando, a par de outros achados aqui recolhidos, interessantes e potenciais contactos mantidos entre
esta área do vale superior do rio Côa e essas regiões meridionais da bacia do Guadalquivir.
Two bronze fibulae are presented from the archaeological fieldworks carried out, between 2014 and 2016,
inside the medieval fortified enclosure in Alto da Pena, in Vila do Touro (Sabugal), which reveals older levels of
occupation, back to the 1st millennium BC.
Although the pieces are fragmented and incomplete, their morphological features allow them to be assigned
a chronology around the 1st Iron Age and fit them into the set of artifacts usually associated with the
“orientalizing world”, denouncing, along with other findings collected here, interesting and potential contacts
maintained between this area of the upper valley of the river Côa and those southern regions of the basin of
the Guadalquivir.
os últimos vinte anos. Impera a variabilidade que se traduz na forma de tratamento, acondicionamento, ritualização e memorização dos mortos. No conjunto, os vestígios não são visual e materialmente muito expressivos, permitindo pensar que a celebração da morte privilegiou não tanto os corpos, sua conservação e proteção, antes outras estratégias mais subtis, com múltiplas faces e disfarces, que a tornam, para nós arqueólogos, uma morte “fugidia”.
The author reflects about practices and funerary rites (and nearly-funerary) from the last stages of the Bronze Age in the Centre of Portugal, emphasising the wide diversity of solutions adopted by communities, amongst themselves or in comparison to their neighbours. The text retrieves old data, sometimes forgotten, crossing
it with results from other research projects undertaken during the last twenty years. The dominant variability is expressed by handling, packing, ritualization and recollection of the dead. Overall, the remains are not that expressive, either visually or materially, allowing thinking that the celebration of death did not focus so much on the bodies, their conservation and protection, and rather privileged other more subtle strategies. Therefore, by having many faces and disguises, for us archaeologist, it becomes an “elusive” death.
We support the idea that the reason for its richness and consequently, for power, was based on natural resources of the region (tin, gold and copper) and on its outward feactures (open spaces with “natural corridors”), as well as on its strategic situation within the scope of the western centre of the Iberia Peninsula.
This performance establishes a relation with the strategic distribution of the settlements where the elites of the time lived – always on the hilltops, able to visually the territory – which originated a territorialization process of the landscape.
The elements connected with power are disseminated through the territory, in the case of stone stelae, or among dwellings, in the case of the so called “prestige goods”. The latter may have been used as instruments of public competition during ceremonies and ritual ostentations. The warrior’s simbolism of the stone stelae would have caused a certain constraint on the population. In spite of the pacifism, also being taken into account by us, both situations reveal the existence of a violent society who judge its powers by coercing through ideological manipulation of their material culture.
In the present study, two metal artefacts from the Late Bronze Age / 1st Iron Age from Southern
Portugal have been analyzed by X-ray fluorescence (XRF) and Scanning Electron Microscopy with X-ray
microanalysis (SEM+EDS).
Despite typological and functional differences, the two objects have been produced in a binary alloy
(Cu+Sn) with a variable presence of Sn and a quite low impurity pattern (<2.0 wt%). The results allow
to frame the two objects within the well-know metallurgical tradition from Late Bronze Age / 1st Iron
Age from Southern Portugal.
According to an inter-and multidisciplinary approach, the paper has been completed with the realization
of 3D models of the two articles (Annex 1). In the case of objects with a quite complex morphology,
digital techniques allow to create interactive and high-definition 3D images, providing the reader a
better perception of objects.
Key-words
South-West; Late Bronze Age / 1st Iron Age; XRF, SEM+EDS; Virtual Archaeology
os últimos séculos do II milénio a. C. e os primeiros do milénio seguinte. Este ensaio, onde se esboçam
algumas hipóteses interpretativas, só foi possível pela revelação recente de diversos dados resultantes
de projetos de investigação e de intervenções desenvolvidas no âmbito de obras públicas, embora
também valorize outros testemunhos conhecidos de há muito. O povoado do Outeiro do Circo, até
pelo seu cariz de inegável marcador territorial n(d)a planície, tomou-se como ponto de partida e o
discurso foi orientado para a análise dos ritmos de vida e de morte, entre a diversidade e a desigualdade
dos espaços, das materialidades e das práticas sociais.
Palavras-chave
Beja (região); Bronze Final; Vida/morte; Tradição/inovação
Abstract
The author presents several thoughts about the settlement framework in the region of Beja between the
last centuries of the 2nd millennium BC and the first centuries of the next millennium. This paper, where
some interpretive hypotheses are drafted, is only possible as new data emerged from a combination of
research projects and public construction interventions, even though former evidence is also valued.
The archaeological site Outeiro do Circo, due to its undeniable trait as a landmark in the Alentejo
plains, is viewed here as a starting point to assess life and death rhythms, along with the diversity and
dissimilarity of spaces, goods and social practices.
Key-words
Beja (region); Late Bronze Age; Life/death; Tradition/innovation
Large numbers of these objects are found in the territory of present-day Portugal and Galicia and we use these as a common thread in our paper to study the Late Bronze Age feasting rituals of that area. We review the available evidence and consider its spread, characteristics and contexts, as well as its social role within the framework of the Late Bronze Age communities.
Com as análises espaciais e as reconstituições arquitectónicas produzidas através destas ferramentas informáticas, pretendeu-se analisar as soluções defensivas adoptadas, do ponto de vista funcional e simbólico, tendo em consideração as características orográficas, a intervisibilidade entre estes povoados e a sua relação com as vias de comunicação naturais e áreas de exploração mineira, e também discutir problemáticas relativas à distribuição destes povoados pelo território e suas eventuais hierarquias e áreas de influência.
SUMMARY
Following previous work on the proto-historic settlement in the upper valley region of the Côa River (Sabugal, Guarda, Portugal) and recent archaeological excavations conducted in some of these settlements, which have added new data to those considerations, we pretend to make now a more specifi c approach to the defensive structures of these population centers using the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and the 3D reconstruction techniques.
With the spatial analysis and architectural reconstructions produced by these digital tools, we intended to analyze the defensive solutions adopted, by a functional and symbolic point of view, taking into account the orographic characteristics, the intervisibility between these
settlements and their relation with the natural paths and mining areas, and discuss also the concerns about the distribution of these settlements through the territory and their possible hierarchies and areas of exploration.
This paper concerns an assemblage of Pre-Roman materials (mostly pottery) recovered during the latest archaeological excavations at the former Roman forum of Aeminium (presently the Machado de Castro National Museum, MNMC, in Coimbra). Despite proceeding from secondary deposits, these finds provide a rare testimony of the earlier human occupations known in Coimbra. Its study aims to develop the actual state of knowledge about Pre-Roman occupations in the city and surrounding region while raising new perspectives on the subject.
KeyWords
Portugal; Penela; 1st millenium BC; Midle Age; Early
Modern Age; Modern Age; Penela archaeology; Economic and Social,
Institutional and Political History; Local and Regional History; Social
Historyspearheads; archaic gold artefacts; Ladeia (Portugal); Christian
Reconquest in present-day Portugal; Ladeia; Manueline charter; Casa de
Aveiro; manor jurisdictions; local officialdom; Garrido, nobility identity
social and economic life; marriage; mortality; family; Salvador Dias Arnaut.