Almost forty years have taken experts to complete the puzzle that made up the different archaeological pieces that they were finding under the hill that is currently occupied by the late medieval castle of Guardamar, in the Vega Baja del Rio Segura (Alicante).
Bronze arrowheads, cauldrons, weaving weights, votive objects, terracotta depictions of female divinities and even a small ceramic plate with two lions attacking a deer, all dating from the Phoenician (8th and 6th centuries BC) and Iberian ( VI BC to I AD). They had no doubt that both peoples had settled in antiquity on the most outstanding mound of this coast, but they did not understand the function of such diverse elements.
In 1986, a team headed by Lorenzo Abad, from the University of Alicante, found terracotta cauldrons in the shape of a female head of Iberian origin that seemed to correspond to a sanctuary. Between 1993 and 1995, other archaeological teams began to collect data on the walls of the medieval fortress of Guardamar, since the City Council wanted to restore it after its destruction by an earthquake in 1829. Thus, the experts came across material evidence of both occupation Iberian as well as an older one from the Ancient Iron Age (8th century BC), at which time the first Phoenicians landed on the Peninsula. Finally, in 2019, during new archaeological excavations.
The hill on which the castle sits rises 64 meters and has good natural defenses on all sides, except to the north, where the slope gently descends until it reaches the course of the Segura. This topographic configuration guaranteed its defense, in addition to making it a place with 360-degree visual control: Vega Baja, the bay, the capes of Santa Pola and Cervera, as well as the island of Tabarca. These conditions did not go unnoticed by the Phoenicians, who chose the knoll as a place to build “a sanctuary that would give protection to navigators or worship deities that should be favorable to them in their colonial enterprise. Therefore, the role it has historically played for navigation is evident, as it is located at the mouth of the river mouth, as a prominent promontory on the coast.
But to which god or goddess to dedicate the sacred construction? The answer has now come by analyzing the exhumed archaeological materials. Among them, a batch of elements related to textile crafts, such as a fusayola, a frame and several loom weights. The researchers believe that “textile manufacturing was a generally female activity that was linked to the cult of the goddess Astarte.” Furthermore, in 1999 two Phoenician bronze arrowheads were unearthed on the slopes of the castle. One of them, double-edged, was used both as a weapon of war and hunting. But the second arrow corresponds to a bronze tip with a lanceolate blade. “Due to its typology it seems to be a specimen from the Syrian-Palestinian coast with a chronology of the IX-VIII centuries BC. C.”, indicate Garcia Menarguez and Prados Martinez. ”In the East, these arrows and other weapons were part of the votive deposits that were made in the sanctuaries. It must have been about religious offerings deposited before the divinity [of Astarte] to correspond to her protection or, who knows, if to thank for having reached a good port after a long and dangerous journey”.
The discovery of a terracotta fragment corresponding to a veiled female figure with a hathoric hairstyle (female Egyptian deities) and a terracotta head with an Egyptian headdress confirmed the suspicions. The first is a figure with her arms crossed over her chest, with almond-shaped eyes and wrinkles on her forehead and ears that directly refer to images of the Phoenician goddess. It is dated between the 7th and 6th centuries BC. C. The head, for its part, has a long neck and is dressed in an Egyptian headdress, a hairstyle that also corresponds to the image of the deity. “These pieces, interpreted as stoppers for sacred containers in some cases, were used in oriental sanctuaries as offerings or ex-votos between the 11th and 8th centuries BC. C.
The authors maintain that the Alicante temple of Astarte did not change its dedication over the centuries, “despite the heterogeneous origin of the navigators who passed through here, the existence of hybridizations or any other type of modification could be assumed. The sacred value of the place must have remained unchanged for centuries”, although the Phoenician goddess ended up becoming “the female divinity of the Iberians, the Tanit of the Carthaginians and a winged goddess from the first moments of Roman rule”.
Astarte, the goddess of the sea, was “Venus, the star that guides at night as it is the first to appear in the sky at sunset: celestial divinity, war, navigation and, fundamentally, fertility and love carnal, but also of the magical and sacred use of water”. And they conclude: “In the area close to the site, no large urban structures are known until the 3rd century BC. C, precisely because the center was the sanctuary itself, which functioned as the main cohesion space for the region”, and all presided over by the protective goddess of sailors, whom everyone brought presents, while the pyre burned.
