Carthaginian necropolis in Ibiza

The island of Ibiza, in the Mediterranean, was colonized by the Carthaginians from 654 BC. C., and they called it Ybošim ("Islands of the god Bes", also referring to the island of Formentera), the name by which it was known also to what is currently the city of Ibiza. Functioning as a naval factory and strategic fortress.

Archaeologists have been discovering various necropolises on the island from the time of the Carthaginians. Large quantities of funerary objects have been found in them, although they are generally objects belonging to rather poor trousseaus, with few precious objects and few gold jewels. Quite the opposite of what happens with the Carthaginian burials in Cádiz. In Ibiza, terracotta figures usually abound with necklaces of glass, bone and ivory beads and rarely a gold pendant. Historians and archaeologists suppose that the Carthaginians buried there were only foremen and servants of the factories that they had established in these lands, while the businessmen and great merchants were buried in Carthage (on the northern coast of Africa). In these necropolises, images of divinities and funerary portraits have been found that were deposited in the tombs so that the spirit of the dead could be incorporated into them.

These necropolises are generally located on reduced plains, of calcareous soil, next to the beaches. The tombs were excavated in the rock and some have survived to this day without having been desecrated, although most were, even with disorder and scattered tombs, which has always been a great problem for archaeologists' research.

Puig des Molins

Orante Terracota, Puig des Molins, s. III a. C. (M.A.N.)

The most important necropolis as an archaeological site is the one found in the Puig des Molins. It is a complex of between 4 and 5 thousand hypogea (found), drilled into the slope of the mount. These are made up of the burial chamber, where the grave goods and the sarcophagus were located, and the entrance shaft. The chamber was sealed with a large slab and the well filled with earth. They were family burial places, and characteristics such as size varied depending on the family's financial capacity. The most recent dead were buried in the sarcophagi, moving the previous ones to the floor of the chamber. Both Romans and Islamic will take advantage of the Punic hypogea to bury themselves, both in the well and in the chamber. The continuous looting of grave goods over the centuries has led to the destruction of the thin underground walls that separate the hypogea in order to move between them more easily and discreetly. This has led to the connection of practically all the chambers, forming the hypogea a system of tunnels reminiscent of those in a cave. The burials are burial or cremation, depending on the time they were occupied.

In them grave goods have been found with hundreds of clay figures (the molds for setting the clay have even been discovered in other excavations). Some are representations of the deceased himself and others are of protective divinities and also of sacred animals. Along with them, amulets, vases with offerings, jewels (rarely), skylights as a lamp or lantern, votive hatchets and coins have been found. The divine representations almost always refer to Demeter and Korah. These goddesses received worship throughout the Mediterranean around the second half of the 5th century BCE. c.

The representations of the deceased are sometimes male, with or without beard, and other times, the most numerous, are female. These are very decorated with a great ornamental wealth, all in clay. The styles of the figures, from the point of view of art, are of three kinds:

• egyptizers
• Punics (the most exuberant)
• Greeks

The fact that the three styles are found is due to the fact that chronologically, the burials found go from the V century to. C. until Roman times.

The female figures generally wear a cloak adorned with great decoration of rosettes, palmettes, scrolls, flowers, scrolls and Greek and oriental themes. The arms were sewn apart and then glued together, sometimes open, other times offering and other times carrying symbols (like the figure in the image). Most of these figures are representations of goddesses, from Greek art because it is believed that over the centuries there was a great ethnic contribution from Magna Graecia (a name given in ancient times to the Greek colonies in southern Italy).

Female clay figure of the 5th or 4th century BC found in the Puig des Molins necropolis.

The image on the right of this page is a female figure made of clay. It is dated to the 5th or 4th century B.C. C. It was found in this necropolis of Puig d'els Molins. She wears a kálathos (or subterranean goddess hat) on her head, a type of crown that grants a divine status after death, as a kind of reward for the devotion that the deceased felt towards the goddess Ashtoreth (Astarte) of the Carthaginians. In her hands she holds a small pig (a symbol). She barely wears jewelry. She has a Semitic physiognomy and her ears are pierced to wear earrings, as well as the dividing cartilage of the nose to hang the ring worn by the Orientals. Other similar statuettes show several holes in her ears instead of just one. This piece is currently in the National Archaeological Museum of Spain, in Madrid.

The necropolis of Puig des Molins is part of the World Heritage Site called "Ibiza, Biodiversity and Culture", declared by Unesco in 1999.