Landscape Exploitation and Biotic Resource Management at the Tossal de la Vila Hillfort through the Long Durée

Abstract

This paper focuses on the anthropic dynamics of environmental transformation and natural resource management in the specific case of the archaeological site of Tossal de la Vila in Castelló, Spain, a hillfort located at the end of the Eastern Iberian Cordillera. It presents two phases of occupation determined by multiple radiocarbon dating analyses: the first phase during the late Bronze Age (8th–7th centuries BCE) and the second at the beginning of the al-Andalus period (8th–10th centuries CE). The results of the comparison of the subsistence strategies and the biotic configuration of the natural environment in the same place at two different times have shown us that in the protohistoric period, the diversity of economic activities represented in the archaeobiological record is certainly heterogeneous, while in the al-Andalus period the complexity of these options is reduced to much less significant limits, possibly due to the different functionality of this space in both periods.

Ribāṭ in the Furthermost Coasts of Early Al-Andalus

“…Owing to recent survey work and the revision of museum collections, but also to systematic archaeological excavations, we now have a considerably extended list of sites, which presents a panorama that is clearly richer in detail. To Bazzana's first group of sites in which living spaces and greater complexity in poliorcetic techniques were identified, we have added the paradigmatic and extensively excavated case of Tossal de la Vila (Negre et al 2020a(Negre et al , 2020b(Negre et al , 2021(Negre et al , 2022Pérez-Polo et al 2023a, 2023b, as well as other cases that have similar characteristics, which are still under study, i.e., El Castellar and La Mola de Genessies. As regards the second group of sites, we could add other examples of large enclosures that have no internal structure, including El Gaidó, El Morico, El Puig de la Mola and El Puig de Gallicant (Bazzana and Guichard 1979;Miret 2011, pp.…”