The interestingly unalive

You won’t mind if I wing this one a bit.  We end today at Baza and it has a rather splendid roundabout to prove it.  Beyond that we are hunkered up against a major road and, while some of it is weird and wonderful, towards the end there is some old stuff, so lets get old.

I always get worried talking about stuff before the Romans because it seems to be the one area that changes really dramatically as new discoveries are made.  In my brief teaching Archaeology at lunchtimes we did old stuff and you realised that the books you could find were well out of date - even if they were only ten years old.

The Iberians to quote wiki ‘The Iberians (Latin: Hibērī, from Greek: Ἴβηρες, Iberes) were an ancient people indigenous to the eastern and southern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula’  Even the term indigenous worries me. I mean, it conjures up ideas that sometime in the distant past they all suddenly woke up from a deep sleep rather than wandered in, then some wandered out, and other people wandered in again.  

If we take Iberian to mean a culture rather than an ethnic group, bit like Celtic, then they seem to have developed in the late 6th BC - although some people reckon they can be traced back to the third millennium in eastern Spain. The easterners were more urbanised,with fortified villages, than the more pastoral central and north-western peoples.  They appear to have had writing, bronze working and agriculture.

Our first site of interest is the Iberian Necropolis Cerro Santuario.  The bodies seem to have been cremated, put in a jar and then buried, some with gold and silver grave goods.  Clearly people dress up as Iberians and I'll bung in a photo. I think if you went, you knew what you were getting so no ‘One star, it was full of stones and dull’.  Javier said ‘Just three kilometers from the town of Baza, in Granada, lies the site of Cerro Cepero, the ancient Iberian-Roman city of Basti.

It was one of the main fortified Iberian cities in the entire country, to the point of giving its name to a vast region, Bastetania, which encompassed most of present-day eastern Andalusia and large parts of Albacete and Murcia, according to contemporary Greco-Roman authors. Possibly founded around the 8th-7th centuries BC, it reached its greatest splendor between the 5th century BC and the 1st century AD. Also occupied by Visigoths and Byzantines, it was abandoned at the beginning of the Middle Ages, its inhabitants relocating to the site of present-day Baza. In 1971, the famous Lady of Baza, the finest example of an Iberian funerary statue found on the Iberian Peninsula, was discovered in one of its necropolises.'

It is also known as the Cerro Largo Archaeological Site, Cerro del Santuario, and Cerro Cepero Basti.

The second site is a link to the town museum and we will leave that for tomorrow.

The Centro de Interpretacion de los Yacimientos has a link https://www.ciyabaza.es/historia.html and a virtual tour. It is worth it to get a sense of the Ibero-Roman town and the graveyard.  The site was developed and still being used during the Moorish period. It has the remains of a Visigothic church from the 6th/7th century.  Karen loved it.  She says so.  ‘Absolutely brilliant, loved every minute. The interactive stations dotted all around the centre of interpretation were brilliant. Very informative. Love it!!’  Carlos was like wise moved ‘A must-see in Baza, learning about its history through this center is a great experience. It's very well preserved and features many depictions of the lives of the ancient inhabitants of Basti.’

Alright, we’ve time for one restaurant. It is by Bazas welcoming roundabout and is called Restaurante Mayorquin. It’s a 7.30am to 5pm sort of a place for weekday travelers only.  According to Google it has a 13 euro menu of the day and some rather tasty looking salmorejo.  Maybe you can judge a place by its top words in reviews. ‘Breakfast’ comes top with 28 and Menu del dia second with 27.  Sandra approved. ‘Good menu, good food, no frills, generous portions, €13 for a starter, main course, drink (water or red wine), bread, and dessert. Quick and attentive service. We had to wait 15 minutes for some beers with a very tasty tapa…’   Manuel concurred ‘Good breakfasts at a very reasonable price. Terrace and dining area. Friendly and efficient staff. Quick access from the highway. Parking available.’

Tomorrow, the very sinful fleshpots of Baza - or not. We might find the museum.