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Make a desert and call it peace: massacre at the Iberian Iron Age village of La Hoya

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2020

Teresa Fernández-Crespo Open the ORCID record for Teresa Fernández-Crespo [Opens in a new window] ,
Javier Ordoño ,
Armando Llanos  and
Rick J. Schulting
Teresa Fernández-Crespo*
Affiliation:
School of Archaeology, University of Oxford, UK Laboratoire méditerranéen de préhistoire Europe Afrique, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France
Javier Ordoño
Affiliation:
Arkikus, Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain
Armando Llanos
Affiliation:
Instituto Alavés de Arqueología, Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain
Rick J. Schulting
Affiliation:
School of Archaeology, University of Oxford, UK
*
*Author for correspondence: ✉ teresa.fernandez-crespo@arch.ox.ac.uk
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Abstract

Once considered rare, archaeological examples of violence in prehistoric Europe have accumulated over recent decades, with new discoveries providing evidence of large-scale, organised warfare among pre- and protohistoric populations. One example is La Hoya in north-central Iberia. Between the mid fourth and late third centuries BC, the site was subjected to a violent attack, its inhabitants killed and the settlement burned. Here the authors present osteological analyses for a massacre: decapitations, amputations and other sharp-force injuries affecting a wide cross section of the community. They interpret the massacre as an instance of conflict between rival local communities, contributing to a growing picture of the scale and nature of violence in Iron Age Europe.

Keywords

IberiaIron Agepalaeopathologymassacreviolencetrauma
Type
Research Article
Information
Antiquity , Volume 94 , Issue 377 , October 2020 , pp. 1245 - 1262
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd, 2020

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