ABANDONED VILLAGES  AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL APPROACH TO STUDY THE SOCIAL AND LANDSCAPE TRANSFORMATIONS
Channel: European Association of Archaeologists
Date: 2020-10-07

The peninsular territory has a huge number of abandoned and uninhabited villages for reasons often related to economic reasons. The Pyrenees has been a space of big migratory currents since the nineteenth century. As a border territory, its inhabitants take advantage of the proximity of France and begin a trip for a job that, over time, stabilizes to become a definitive emigration. This involves the emptying of many Pyrenean villages. Indeed it is necessary to focus on the effects of the Spanish Civil War from which two or three new migratory waves begin: the exiled ones of the war; The movements due to the proximity of the border and the effects of the guerrillas and the Francoist repression during the post-war period; And a last wave during the 1960s, linked to economic reasons. At this regard, the role of archeology is fundamental. The large number of abandoned or semi-inhabited peoples have kept intact many signs of life of the 20th century and earlier centuries. His study offers several opportunities, such as: the archaeological study itself and the observation of the reverse process of the collapse of a site;the analysis of the real reasons for abandonment, such as economic shortcomings or economic and social repression;understand the social and political networks in the Pyrenees;The transformations of the landscape linked to the abandonment of the villages. All this requires an archeological and historical research in order to know that, as we can observe by the first signs, many such decisions were planned and not involuntary. Thus the Pyrenees become an open deposit area with the multiplicity of abandoned villages. All in all, the systematic study of abandoned villages in the central and western Catalan Pyrenees can provide data on the real effects of economics, politics, social behaviors and ideologies during the 20th century.

Author(s): Jané, Oscar (Autonomous University of Barcelona) - Gascón, Carles (UNED) - Vergés, Oliver (Autonomous University of Barcelona) - Guàrdia, Carlos (University of Barcelona)