MODELS AND ALLOYS. ARCHAEOLOGY AND PROVENANCE STUDIES BETWEEN BRONZE AGE IBERIAN PENINSULA AND SARDINIA

In the occasion of the International conference (Gothenburg, April 26th 2013): ITALY, MEDITERRANEAN AND EUROPE IN THE BRONZE AGE: Trade, travels and migrations in the mid to late 2nd millennium BC, a contribution was presented concerning: Nuragic Sardinia between East and West: Interconnections in the Mediterranean: 2003-2013, updating the rich panorama of new data on the connections of this island in the mediterranean trade network from LH III A2 to LH III C. At the end of the presentation a short reference was made to a strong connection between Iberian peninsula and Sardinia in the period preceding the full Nuragic Civilisation, that is the archeological facies of Sant'Iroxi, between the Early and Middle Bronze Age periods (between the end of XVII and the first half of XVI centuries BC). In the eponymous hypogeum of Sant'Iroxi-Decimoputzu (Cagliari), 13 swords were discovered, fashioned after the Argaric model that, when analysed, were found to be made by a local copper-arsenic alloy. An important discovery was found in the passage to the central Tower A of the nuraghe of Serucci-Gonnesa (Cagliari). A dagger-halberd of a shape unknown in Sardinia but well known in Iberian Peninsula from the Bell-Beaker period onward, is now under analysis and apparently also locally made under external western influence. The issue is to open the discussion from the archaeological and analytical point of view, in the wider framework of the East and West interconnections in the Mediterranean and beyond.