O SÍTIO PRÉ-HISTÓRICO DO SOBRAL DO MARTIM AFONSO (SALVATERRA DE MAGOS, PORTUGAL): UM CURIOSO CONTEXTO DO NEOLÍTICO FINAL/CALCOLÍTICO NA MARGEM ESQUERDA DO BAIXO TEJO

Abstract

Known since the late 19th century and assumed as a burial place due to the finding of some artefacts and objects typical of that kind of contexts, the prehistoric site of Sobral do Martim Afonso offers a series of questions regarding the study of the Late Neolithic/Chalcolithic communities in the Southwestern Iberian Peninsula. One can highlight: 1) the apparent coincidence between a settlement and a burial site, gathering in the same place the spaces for the living and the spaces for the dead; 2) the "culturally megalithic" features of the funerary context thereby identified, in an area in which there are no known megalithic monuments and where they could not have virtually existed, due to the actual absence of capable constructive supports in the local geological substract; 3) its geographical position, in the transition area between Alentejo and the Lisbon Peninsula. This paper intends to present new interpretative readings about this archaeological site, regarding its possible specific functionality and according to the data currently available.