Iron Age Connectivity Revealed by an Assemblage of Egyptian Faience in Central Iberia

Abstract

Research concerning transactions in the early first millennium BC in the westernmost Mediterranean has tended to focus on colonial coastlands occupied by scattered Levantine outposts, whereas cross-cultural interactions in hinterland regions have remained ill-defined. This article presents an assemblage of Egyptian vitreous artefacts, namely beads, a Hathor amulet, and further items from the seventh-century BC rural village of Cerro de San Vicente (Salamanca) in the interior of Spain. Macroscopic and chemical analyses demonstrate their likely manufacture in Egypt during the Middle and New Kingdom (second millennium BC), attesting to a far-reaching Phoenician maritime network that connected both ends of the Mediterranean. The authors interpret the items as liturgical objects, rather than mere high-status trinkets, that formed part of a widely shared Mediterranean world view and associated ritual mores. They consider the impact of cultural syncretism, which reached even remote and allegedly isolated peripheral settings in Iberia.