User:Delphinefontesse/Iberian settlement of Ullastret

Iberian village in Ullastret
The Iberian village in Le puy de Sant Andreu in Ullastret is an archaeological site situated in the municipal territory of Ullastret, on the Bay of Empordà (Girona).

The archaeological site
The Iberian village in Le puy de Sant Andreu in Ullastret is the biggest one in Catalonia. Archaeologists think that it did have been an important city, capital of Iberian tribe which was called “Indiketes” by late writers. The first Iberian village in Ullastret appeared the first half of the 6th century BC, although this area was associated to previous colonies of the first Iron Age. This village was built on a promontory and encircled by a high wall from which they could control all the surrounding landscape. The village is part of a most wide archaeologic range of the Iberian era, of which we known another village, a necropolis and a set of small colonies dispersed on all the territory.

Wall
The wall is one of the most complexed and elaborated indigenous fortifications of the Iberian Peninsula. Several steps of constructions and different reparations have been necessary for the current wall. Today, we know more than 930 meters of the west, south and east side of the wall; but it presumably encircled the whole village. From an architectural perspective, the most complicated part of the wall stands in the West (we can see it in arriving in the site); it defended the most vulnerable side of the city. In the West, seven towers reinforce the wall; they are separated from one another by around 28 meters. There is a tower at the north end of the wall and a watch tower in the south side of the city next to the temple enclosure. Nine front doors in the city have been discovered until today. Some of them were blocked proves that they were already not use in the last time of the village. With some recent geophysical prospects, a huge defense ditch was discovered at the same time of fortifications demarcation of the east side of the hill.