Contribución al estudio del poblamiento, modos de vida y ritual funerario del neolítico antiguo: el asentamiento al aire libre de El Prado (Pancorbo, Burgos)

Abstract

The archaeological excavation at the site El Prado has documented an Early Neolithic open air settlement and has discovered almost thirty negative structures that were part of an habitat belonging to the early vth millennium cal bc. Its location on a valley bottom beside the gorge of Pancorbo –natural corridor exploited from prehistory times to connect the Ebro valley and the Meseta–, partly explains the location of the settlement. Amongst the documented structures are several storage pits she athed with clay, a well pit and two burials. The latter are both for their structural characteristics and for their ritual, an important contribution to the knowledge of funerary practices during the Early Neolithic, and they will supplement the meagre map and the unequal distribution of findings documented in the peninsula until the end of the vth millennium cal bc. The palynological study provides interesting data on bioclimatic characteristics and anthropization of the environment, and the archaeological material recovered shows clear connections with the contexts of the Ebro valley, but also showing the cultural peculiarities of the Duero basin.