The discovery and excavation of an Iberian monumental aristocratic complex near Cabra, the remains of a Caesarian battlefield in Montemayor, and the burial of an Iberian chariot of the ‘bastetano’ type in this municipality are opening new perspectives on the Iberian Culture in the Cordovan countryside and the process of Roman conquest between the end of the 3rd and middle of the 1st century BC, all within the framework of the project ‘Iberian cities and aristocratic complexes in the Roman conquest of Upper Andalusia’ (HAR 2017-8806-P). I century BC, all within the framework of the project ‘Iberian cities and aristocratic complexes in the Roman conquest of Upper Andalusia’ (HAR 2017-82806-P).

The conference presents the final results of two consecutive research projects HAR2009-11334, El desarrollo de las guerras civiles romanas y la transformación del mundo indígena en el sureste de Hispania, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, and HAR2012-32754, Las huellas de las guerras civiles romanas en el sureste de Hispania. Conflicts and cultural transformation, funded by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness.

A series of enclaves located on the north coast of Alicante, considered to be small Iberian settlements from the final phase, 2nd-1st centuries BC, which are now identified as small forts of the Roman civil wars built by the Sertorian army around 77 BC, are reviewed. The analysis of their location in relation to the geographical and maritime environment confirms that they constituted an intercommunicated network, with great effectiveness in the strategy of controlling the traffic of the Senatorial ships off the Alicante coast on their way from Ebusus to Carthago Nova and, if necessary, the assault on them, aided by the Cilician pirate fleet to stockpile the products they were transporting. At the same time, the garrisons stationed in these forts would complete their supplies with products derived from the economic activity of the Iberian population in the interior of the valleys, where they would even provide themselves with auxiliary soldiers. This confirms the alliance of the Iberian Contestans with Sertorius, as recorded by Titus Livy in Periocha XCI. Thus, in contrast to the traditional discourse based on the silence of the written sources, the archaeological data show that the south-eastern area of the peninsula, and the province of Alicante in particular, played an important role in the territorial and maritime strategy of the Roman civil conflicts in Hispania.

The Project of Excellence Methodology for the archaeological study of battlefields and sieges in the context of the Second Punic War: Metauro, Iliturgi and Castulo (207/206 BC) (HAR2016-77847-P), aims to address, among other case studies, the archaeological analysis of the Iberian oppidum of Iliturgi and its leading role in the Second Punic War. Iliturgi and its territory become a laboratory to contrast different models of historical-archaeological interpretation proposed for other Iberian oppida and territories of the Upper Guadalquivir.

This research project aims to provide a novel reading of a specific territory, a reading that takes into account recent theoretical models that consider the complexity of the dialectic established between the conqueror and the conquered, the models of resistance, transformation, acceptance, imitation, emulation, hybridisation… that will lay the foundations for subsequent Romanisation, understood as a heterogeneous and local form of adaptive response to the new cultural, social, political and economic circumstances.