Monduver Paleolandslide as its relationship with the human use of the Parpalló Cave (Valencia province, Spain)
The Monduver massif located 50 km to the south-east of Valencia city has a well-developed Karst geomorphology and where it stands out the Barx Polje. The Highest point of the Massif, Moduver 841 m a.s.l., is just 10 km inland from the Mediterranean coast. The Parpallo Cave located at the southern part of the polje is one of the most important Palaeolithic sites, not only in Spain, but in the world due to the collection of decorated plaquettes of Palaeolithic portable art. The collection covers the entire archaeological sequence from the Gravettian to the Magdalenian periods (26000–11000 years BP). The Barx polje has two subbasins: Barx to the north and La Drova to the south, and the second one is partly capture at the south by the Caldereta Creek. In this work is proposed than the La Drova subbasin was formed by a major landslide of the western side of the Monduver massif producing a natural dam of the Les Voltes Creek. Lately, the La Drova subbasin was filled by the terra rossa product of the limestone dissolution of the polje basin, as can be see today in the sides of the captured La Drova subbasin. The filling of the subbasin was to a level higher that the Barx subbasin as the today drainage of the uncaptured La Drova runs to this last one. Three 3d model landscape figures has been made to explain its evolution. The archeological sequence of the Parpallo Cave could be related with the infilling of the subbasin period and the landslide could take place before the human use of the cave.
Cite as: Tent-Manclús, J. E. y Jordá Guijarro, J. (2021): Monduver Paleolandslide as its relationship with the human use of the Parpalló Cave (Valencia province, Spain). LAC1+1, Landscape archaeology conference, 8-11 june 2021 Book of Abstracts. 14 p.
Pottery clays quarries in the domain territory of ancient Ilici (Alicante, SE Spain)
The Alcudia archaeological site correspond to the ancient city of Ilici (Roman Colonia Iulia Ilici Augusta). The site consists of an succession of Iberian, roman, byzantine, Visigoth and Moorish settlements (since the 5th centuries BC to the 8th century AC) on the top of a hill that in the 1st century BC was surrounded by a wall and nearby the Vinalopó river mouth in the Bajo Segura Bay. This bay was known in Roman times as the sinus Ilicitanus. Different clays of the area nearby to the site have been sampled, analysed and then compared with analysis of some pottery remains of the different periods of the Alcudia settlement. The clays have been analysed by micro-X Ray fluorescence (µXRF) and by infrared spectrometry by Fourier transformed (ATR-FTIR), as crude, mixed in different proportions, and then heated to a different temperature until 900ºC. The old remains show affinities with the clays sampled from the Eastern part indicating a W-E influence, as the northern coast of the sinus ilicitanus. During the roman period and later the pottery was made using the nearby clays located just to the north of the site clearly influenced by the via Augusta. The topography to the north of the site is formed by low but steep hills and small creeks that possibly limit the commerce to the north, so the commerce follows the marine plain coast of the northern sinus ilicitanus. The opening of the roman road via August along the Vinalopó Valley favoured the use of pottery clays from the interior of the territory.
Cite as: Jordá Guijarro, J., Cerdán Sala, M., Sánchez-Sánchez, A., Ronda Femenia A., Tendero Porras, M. and Tent-Manclús, J. E. (2021): Pottery clays quarries in the domain territory of ancient Ilici (Alicante, SE Spain). LAC1+1, Landscape archaeology conference, 8-11 june 2021 Book of Abstracts. 45 p.
The development of the sinus illicitanus (II)
Change on the coastline of the Southern Alicante region
Tent-Manclús, J. E.
The Bajo Segura Region is a plain dominated by the Segura River with the mouth towards the Mediterranean Sea on Guardamar. The Hondón and Salinas de Santa Pola lagoons inside the plain, are the remains of a major marine bay known in the Roman times as the sinus ilicitanus. Offshore the Region geophysical data has permitted to model the coastline change and study the underwater marine terraces. 183 maps have been made from the 15000 BP until Today (100 year apart the older ones and 25 years for the recent ones). The coastline has migrated between 20 and 50 km onshore and then offshore about tens of meters to 35 km shaping today coastline. The sea level at 15000 BP was located 70 m below today sea-level (btsl). During the Younger Dryas (13500 to 11700 BP) varies around 60-66 m btsl then increase until 21 m btsl and stopped during the 8.2 ka event (8500 BP to 8200 BP). Again, the level increases first fast and then slowly but moving fast horizontally (near 35 km for 1000 years) developing the sinus ilicitanus when the marine transgression enters the plain about 4200 BC. The Segura River developed a delta in the today area of Orihuela, 35 km to the East of its today river mouth in Guardamar. The river until around the year 1400 AD developed a fingering (bird-foot) quite variable delta in the center of the sinus, most of the major irrigation canals (acequias) could correspond to the ancient delta-channels. Around the XV century major events changed the sinus basin producing the river mouth move to the present location. The sinus open communication with the Mediterranean Sea was closed around the XVIII century by sand bars, first the southern of Guardamar and then the northern on Santa Pola.
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