Sacred Precincts

When the Phoenicians arrived on the Iberian peninsula, probably at the end of the ninth century B.C., they came into contact with an indigenous people called the Tartessians. The two cultures soon fused. The hybrid culture produced by this fusion of peoples is evident in a mysterious structure at Cancho Roano, deep in the heart of south-central Spain. The structure at Cancho Roano is sometimes called a “palace-sanctuary” because of its monumentality. But it was not a 022palace at all; it was simply a Tartessian sanctuary, which over time became influenced by Phoenician culture.a Scholars have only recently […]