Maria Carme Belarte

Institut Català d'Arqueologia Clàssica (ICAC)

Humanities

PhD in Geography and History (1995), University of Barcelona, for my research work on proto-historic societies in Catalonia through the analysis of their domestic architecture. From 1996 to 1998 I was a post-doctoral researcher at the CNRS (Unité Mixte de Recherche 5140 - Lattes, France). From 1999 to 2003, I worked at the University of Barcelona as a post-doctoral researcher. In 2004, I took a position at the ICAC to start a research programme about the protohistoric societies and to create a research group specialized in this period. I joined ICREA in 2006; since then, I develop my research at the ICAC in collaboration with researchers of Catalan, French and Tunisian Institutions. In 2013, I received Positive Assessment from the AQU Catalunya (Catalan Evaluation Agency) in order to apply for a university full professor position.


Research interests

The general goal of my research is to study the complex societies of the first millennium BC in western Mediterranean. I am interested in the processes leading to the formation of these societies during the Late Bronze Age as well as their social organisation during the Iron Age (first millennium BC). From a geographical point of view, my research is conducted in North-eastern Iberian Peninsula, South of France and North of Africa. More particularly, my current research focuses on two main issues. On the one hand, the study of settlement patterns, domestic architecture and social use of space. On the second hand, the analysis of rituals, mortuary practices and use of funerary space. The combined analysis of settlement and burial sites enables the understanding of social organisation, and yields information about the appearance of social differences and hierarchy in the Iron Age communities.

Selected publications

Belarte MC, Camañes MP, Monrós M & Principal J 2016, ‘Cooking in the Iberian Culture (sixth-second centuries BC): Private or Public?‘, Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology, 29.2, 173-196.

– Kallala N, Sanmartí J (dirs) & Belarte MC (ed) 2016, Althiburos II. La fouille dans l’aire du capitole et dans la nécropole méridionale: études. Documenta 28, Institut Català d’Arqueologia Clàssica, Tarragona.

Belarte MC & Ramon J 2016, ‘L’architecture et l’urbanisme durant la période numide’, Kallala N, Sanmartí J (dirs) & Belarte MC (ed) 2016, Althiburos II. La fouille dans l’aire du capitole et dans la nécropole méridionale: études. Documenta 28, Institut Català d’Arqueologia Clàssica, Tarragona, 13-47.

Belarte MC & Camañes P 2016, ‘Activités domestiques et vie quotidienne en Ibérie septentrionale’, De Chazelles C-A, Schwaller M, Gruat P, Mazière F (eds), Vie quotidienne, tombes et symboles des sociétés protohistoriques de Méditerranée nord-occidentale. Mélanges offerts à Bernard Dedet, ADAL, Lattes (Monographies d’archéologie méditerranéenne), 45-61.

Belarte MC, Plana-Mallart R, Prado G de 2016, ‘Chronique d’archéologie ibérique : l’âge du Fer sur le littoral catalan, bilan de la recherche récente’, Documents d’Archéologie Méridionale, 37 (2014), 225-250.


Selected research activities

– PI: Caracterización de los asentamientos urbanos en la costa de la Iberia septentrional (s. VI-III aC): teledetección, documentación y restitución de estructuras constructivas (HAR2015-67946-C2-2-P).

– PI: Formes d’ocupació del territori i evolució del poblament a la Cessetània occidental durant la protohistòria (Ier mil·lenni aC).

– Teaching at the URV-UAB-ICAC Classical Archaeology Master.

Organization of conferences and seminars

– La metal·lúrgia del ferro i la formació de les societats complexes a la Mediterrània occidental – 8th International Archaeological Meeting of Calafell. October 2016.

– II International Seminar La conservació i restauració en l’arqueologia: una eina per a la recerca i la divulgació. Tarragona, December 2016.