The inhumations
In the mill enclosure, at the base of one of its walls, three trenches with four children inhumations were found. Another four perinatal burials and a burial of one of their foetus were also documented in one of the houses.
These inhumations are done in trenches dug under the room’s ground and attached to the walls. The trenches were dug at the same time that the house was being built. We know this because the sediment filling is not different from the one that forms the strata levelling of the soil. One of them was done later than the previous ones because the pavement of the room was altered to dig the trench.
The anthropological study of the human remains has allowed us determine the age they died. It was, in the cases studied, between one and three months old. It should be noted that the foetus bones, died at the age of four months of gestation, point it as the smallest one found until now in settlements from the Iron Age in the Western Mediterranean.
In the Iberian period children were buried inhumed, and not incinerated as adults were, in the domestic area. When so small children died, they weren’t treated the same way as adults: they didn’t have the same ritual and they were buried with no personal objects.
Archaeological material
Among the material found in the site there’s a predominance of the Iberian wheel-thrown pottery with no ornamentation and the kitchen pottery coarser than the previous one and with darker pastes. The ornamented fragments with geometrical decorations are scarce. The most common pieces are those of amphorae and large vessels but there are also Kalathos1, dishes and bowls.
Among the import pottery, it stands out that coming from the Punic and Greek-Italic trade represented by fragments of Roman and Punic amphorae, grey ampuritana pottery and black varnish pottery. The fragments belonging to this group are scarce but significant because they help us to specify the trade relations that the inhabitants of the village would carry out and they also allow us to specify the site’s chronological profile.
The craft activities are represented by the presence of stone mills and objects, such as spindle whorls and loom-weight (pondus)2, destined to textile activities.
Economical activity
The analysis of the vegetal remains has allowed us to know the main economical activities of the inhabitants of the village. It stands out the agriculture; the main crops were wheat and barley. They could be used as flour, bread or cooked. There are also vine remains used as fresh or dried fruit. Grapes and barley could also be used as alcoholic drinks.
The cattle industry is reflected by the presence of domestic species such as the goat, the sheep and the pig.
They took advantage of the wild resources of the surroundings to obtain wood for the construction, the tool production, combustible, etc. Carbon analyses have allowed us to determine the arboreal species that surrounded the village. We can highlight the Aleppo pine (pinus halepensis), cluster pine (pinus pinaster), red pine (pinus sylvestris), holm oak (quercus perennifolio) and arbutus (arbustus unedo).
The hunting would be another form of taking advantage of the resources due to the confirmed presence of deer and wild goats.
Els Estrets-Racó de Rata is an Iberian site located in Vilafamés. It is surrounded by a reinforced wall with bastions and a circular tower. In the village different areas have been dug. The spectacular nature of this site lies in its architecture; the walls of the houses preserve more than two metres height in some points, especially in the tower with four metres height preserved.