The roman-republican castella on the south-eastern coast of Hispania Citerior: the beginning of the romanization of the Iberian population

Abstract

Some archaeological sites located on coastal promontories of the north coast of Alicante (Spain) were traditionally interpreted as small Iberian enclaves from the 2^nd and 1^st century BC dedicated to trade with Rome. This interpretation stemmed from their location next to good inlets and the outstanding number of Roman amphorae and fine ware among the findings. However, the research project being developed since 2010 reinterprets these sites as a network of forts built during the first roman civil wars, around 77 BC, to control the passage of senatorial ships between Ebusus and Carthago Nova. In this new context, Roman ceramics are no longer the object of exchange between Iberians and Italic merchants, but the kitchen and tableware used by legionaries, as well as the storage containers for their own food. The Iberian amphorae and other painted Iberian vessels present in the forts are the containers of the products that the Iberian population, allied with Sertorius, provided for the provisioning of the soldiers, but it may also be pointing out a hypothetical presence of Iberian auxilia in the coastal garrisons. In any case, it is through this contact, in the midst of a war in the 70's BC, when the Iberian population of the regio Contestania first encounters the Roman economic system and starts the slow transmission of new cultural values.