El archipiélago de las Casitérides y el comercio púnico en el noroeste de Iberia

Abstract

This paper presents a synthesis of the results of the Proyecto Estrímnides, which includes the historiographical analysis of the Graeco-Latin and modern European literature on the Cassiterides and the study of the archaeological record of several Galician castros. With regard to the first of these subjects, the location of the archipelago has been the focus of research until the middle of the 20th century and is based on an artificial diatribe originated by W. Camden in the 16th century when he identified the Tin Islands with the Scilly Islands (United Kingdom). On the contrary, the study of ancient texts reveals beyond any doubt that they were located off the coast of Iberia, and that the first news could have been gathered in the Phoenician emporium of Onoba (Huelva), where there was a Greek Ionian community. Such news would have been summarized by Hecataeus of Miletus (c. 500 BC) in his work Periegesis in the form of a “geography of the resources”. On the other hand, the study of the archaeological evidence from the Galician castros has allowed us to identify three phases in the distribution of products from the «Circle of the Strait», starting at the end of the 5th century B.C. and continuing until the Roman Imperial period. Moreover, this project has also examined the ways in which the intercommunity relations were articulated, and how the so-called “betyllic sanctuaries” played a major role for this purpose.