Negotiation, premeditade imposition or spontaneous phenomenon? The specific ritual developed in Gadir under the barcids

Resumen

This work analyses the social impact of the landing of the Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barca on Gadir in237 BCE, as well as the influence exerted in a pre-war and war context, between the later “occupation” of the Phoeniciancity by the North African army and the defeat of Gadir in 206 BCE. The arrival of such substantial forces, althoughthey were supposedly “friends” and “allies”, should necessarily have both quantitative and qualitative consequences onthe social balance of Gadir. Two factors in particular must be taken into account when examining these decades: 1) aremarkable increase of population in a city with limited space and 2) the forced cohabitation between the inhabitants ofGadir and people of various ethnic and social backgrounds, who had their own religious practices and beliefs and weremainly male members of an army waiting to go into action. Although textual evidence is available on these stages, thesources regard mainly very specific aspects and events leading up to the Second Punic War, with little reference to thesocial context of a de facto occupied city. The silence of the written sources notwithstanding, archaeology does provideevidence suggesting that the interaction between the local population and the Carthaginian army was not withoutconflict and allowing us to investigate strategies for channelling those social tensions. In particular, we suggest includingthe “ritual wells” among the religious responses to the social tension occurring during the second half of the 3rd centuryBCE. This peculiar ritual practice, indeed, is currently attested at Gadir especially during this time span and it is likelyto be connected to these “times of crisis”.