The Iberian site of Assut de Tivenys (Baix Ebre) continues to be a source of surprises for archaeologists nearly a quarter of a century after excavations began. The twenty-fourth campaign, which ended last week, has not only made it possible to delimit the perimeter of the town, but has also served to identify the temple, a place of worship built outside the walls, something unusual in the Iberian world of the peninsular northwest.
The town of Assut, according to the director of the works and professor at the URV, Jordi Diloli, was not only the center of political, social and economic power for the Iberians, but also played an important role in the internal military conflicts of the Republican Rome of the first century before our era.
Despite the fact that it is not a unique case in the Iberian Peninsula, Diloli has specified that in the northwest area and in Catalonia there are no examples of a place of worship like the one discovered in Assut: “at first it is something strange, because we do find sanctuaries and is next to a gate.” He explains that they even came to think that “the Iberian architects had gone crazy” because it made “no sense” to build a temple outside the defensive wall.
The meeting of some “indicative” elements that make it a “singular” space has been decisive. Among them, a bench that wrapped the interior perimeter, the distribution of space or access from outside. This year it has been able to finish identifying itself as a place of worship. “If they had to enter the town, they did a purification or sanctification before entering, they prayed in the chapel and went inside,” he ventured.
The presence of the outer temple would come to reinforce the relevance in archaeological and historical terms of this Iberian settlement that visually dominates a considerable section of the Ebre. A team of between ten and sixteen people, including researchers and students, has worked at the site from June 26 to July 14, led by archaeologists from GRESEPIA-URV.
The objective of this campaign, beyond this discovery, was to delimit the outer perimeter of the town, finishing connecting the T4 and T5 towers with the wall. “We will have to excavate the part inside, which could take another 25 years,” Diloli jokes.
Over the years, the size of the site has exceeded all initial expectations of finding a space to study the evolution of protohistoric settlement in the final stretch of the Ebre. “We knew there was something, but not the magnitude. When we started at the top, we thought it would be a hopeful town and little else. Until we saw that it was not: it was going down and we talked about almost half a hectare. When we started, there were 1,500 or 2,000 square meters of town at the most. But it has become very large”, says the person in charge of the works.
Around 130 before our era, the part populated by the Iberians was abandoned. For this reason, as in the case of the coll del Moro de Gndesa, it would not represent its end. The Romans would have partially rebuilt and reformed it, to endow it with military functions. Specifically in the context of the civil wars between Sertori and Gneu Pompeu, in the first century before our era.
Structural modifications remain from that time: a bricked-up door and the reoccupation of spaces to better defend them. Control of the mouth of the Ebre and its role as a communication corridor towards the interior of the peninsula give it a strategic position, both for trade and for military control.
After this year’s campaign, Diloli and the GRESEPIA archaeologists believe that the twenty-fifth anniversary would be a good time to stop for a year to process the data and materials chosen and “do a little science.” They are aware that the work dynamics do not make it easy, but they consider that it is necessary to put in context and relate the weights of Punic measures, the coins and ceramic fragments from “the entire Mediterranean”.
“We have structural issues of the site itself, explanations, publishing the theme of the temple, very unique in the Iberian part. If we dig, we won’t be able to do it, because we will generate more information, ”he clarifies. No less important, he stresses, it would also be a good time to “consolidate” the structures uncovered in recent years to prevent their deterioration.
The site is owned by the URV itself, which bought it in 2010. The excavation campaign by the same university, the Department of Culture through the four-year archaeological research project and the Tivenys Town Hall, which also provides spaces to accommodate the participants.
