Three chalcedony tools from Castro of Zambujal

Pablo Martn-Ramos, Mara del Carmen Ramos-Snchez, Francisco Javier Martn-Gil

Three chalcedony tools from Castro of Zambujal

Pablo Martn-Ramos, Mara del Carmen Ramos-Snchez, Francisco Javier Martn-Gil

1.

Introduction

The Castro do Zambujal is a Neolithic age archeological site (coordinates

39427.78N 9178.20; elevation, 86 m;) in the civil parish of Santa Maria do Castelo
e So Miguel, in Torres Vedras, western littoral area of the Portuguese Centro Region
(Fig. 1).
The Zambujal Castro is one of the most important Copper Age settlements in the
peninsula of Lisbon, and whose culture lasted until the beginning of the agrarian periods
of Iberian history. Apart from being the most northerly discovered Copper Age site in
Portugal, it went through two main building phases: an import-oriented phase and the
second associated with the Beaker culture.
The site was discovered and interpreted in 1932 by the Portuguese archaeologist L.
Trindade [1]
The lithic industry in Zambujal was studied in 1995 by M. Uerpmann [2] and more
recently by Jordo and Pimentel [3]

Figure 1. Panoramic view of Castro of Zambujal

2.

Report of three lithic artifacts

2.1. About the finding and holding of the lithic artifacts

In a visit to the Castro in 1998, the authors of this article noticed that a very old
woman, who lived in one of the houses located on the site, watched us carefully. We
approached to greet her and ask her for a flat level place where carry out astronomical
observations. Our use of a poor Portuguese took to the old woman to confound "plane"
with flat and with great diligence went into his house and came out with a flat dish
containing twenty stone artifacts. She had mistaken us for professional archaeologists
and was giving us his findings. For reasons of honesty we clarify our professional status
and deny delivery. However, the old woman, with a big smile, took three pieces and she
insisted we take us. Finally, he gave us one to each (Fig. 2).
2.2. Description of the pieces
One of the pieces is a gray, fractured, backed blade, characterized by two ribs and
trapezoidal section, 2,05 g in weight; another is a white driller (or piercer) on blade for
use with fingers, characterized by one rib, flat back, triangular in section and straight
base, 2,357 g in weight; and the third, a pointed blade of one rib, flat back, triangular in
section and flat black, to be used as arrowhead or as a drill (it could be the broken tip of
a drill), 0,31 g in weight. The three artifacts are worked in chalcedony, possible
collected along the quaternary terraces of the Sizandro River, West of Torres Vedras,
where decimetric-sized flint cobbles are visible at the topographic surface c. 2,5 km NW
of Zambujal site [3].
Tipologically, the shape of the pieces is similar to those from other Neolithic
settlements (Fig. 3)

Figure 2. Neolithic chalcedony backed blade, drill/borer, and arrowhead point found in
Zambujal

Figure 3. Artifacts from other Neolithic settlements analogous those reported

3.

Material and methods

X-ray powder diffractograms of the samples were obtained using a Bruker (Billerica, MA,
USA) D8 Advance Bragg-Brentano diffractometer, in reflection geometry.
Infrared spectra were recorded with a Thermo Scientific (Waltham, MA, USA) Nicolet
iS50 FT-IR spectrometer, equipped with an in-built diamond ATR system, in order to identify
the chemical functional groups.

4.

Results

Analysis by X-ray diffraction (XRD) shows a series of peaks in good correspondence with
those characteristic of chalcedony quartz: 2 = 21.07, 26.84, 36.77, 39.67, 42.66, 50.36,
55.15, 55.58 , 60.09, 60.27, 62.35, 68.38 and 68.58 (Fig. 4). Chalcedony is not
scientifically its own mineral species, but rather a form of quartz in microcrystalline form. In the

gem trade, the name chalcedony usually describes only white or bluish chalcedony, as the
exhibited by the studied artifacts.

Figure 4. X-ray poder diffractogram of the reported pieces

The chalcedony/quartz characteristic ATR-FTIR absorption bands should appear at 696,

513 and 459 cm-1 frequencies [4]. The blade under study exhibits bands at 508 and 461 cm-1; the
perforator, at 510 and 459 cm-1; and the arrowhead at 696, 509 and 454 cm-1 (Fig. 5), in good
agreement therefore with literature

(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 5. ATR-FTIR spectra of (a) blade, (b) borer and (c) arrowhead, showing the
characteristic bands of quartz/chalcedony at around 510 and 455 cm-1

Conclusion
This paper is a contribution to the study of the siliceous resources procurement and
management from the chalcolithic enclosure of Zambujal. The techno-typological
analysis of three studied artefacts (blade, borer and arrowhead) has concluded a same
mineral origin and this will allow the correct identification of the flints source areas for
the archaeological artifacts found in Zambujal, today under discussion.

Bibliography
1. Sangmeister, E.; Schubart, H.; Trindade, L. (1969), "Escavaes no Castro
Eneoltico do Zambujal", O Arquelogo Portugus (in Portuguese), Srie III, vol. 3,
Lisbon, Portugal.
2. Uerpmann, M. (1995). A indstria da pedra lascada no Zambujal: alguns resultados.
In Kunst, M., ed. - Origens, estruturas e relaes dasculturas calcolticas da
Pennsula Ibrica. Actas das I Jornadas Arqueolgicas de Torres Vedras (Torres
Vedras, 1987). Lisboa: IPPAR (Trabalhos deArqueologia; 7), p. 37-43.
3. Jordo, P.; Pimentel, N. The Zambujals arrowheads: a petroarchaeologic approach
to flints.
4. Chukanov, N.V. Infrared spectra of mineral species. Vol1. Springer
Geochemistry/Mineralogy. DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-7128-4