Call it home: Mesolithic dwellings in the Ebro Basin (NE Spain)

The vast majority of documented Mesolithic sites throughout the basin occupy the frequent limestone, sandstone or conglomeratic rockshelters that proliferate in the ranges flanking the north and the lower flat areas in the south. There, natural “roofed” refuges are scarce, and prehistoric groups inhabited open-air campsites. Archaeological surveys are difficult to conduct in these flat terrains due to high-scale Holocene erosive processes, which hamper our knowledge of the actual dwelling strategies in Mesolithic times. Across the basin, only one open-air site is known about compared to more than forty rockshelters. Of these, most share common elements: they are small, open to the rising sun and appear next to rivers or ravines, guaranteeing access to fresh water and control of potential game. Some show evidence of human presence from the Magdalenian times; others were in use in the Neolithic period and beyond. A common feature is the final prehistoric usage of funerary sites during the Chalcolithic period. Many sites are in close vicinity to one another, but due to the imprecision of our data, it is impossible to know with certainty whether different groups occupied them at the same time. Most habitual structures found in them are hearths, usually circled (or even paved) with local cobbles or slabs, but some space arrangements (rudimentary walls, postholes…) have been occasionally documented.