Scents and Sensibilities: The Phenomenology of Late Neolithic Iberian Slate Plaque Production

The engraved slate plaques of Late Neolithic (3500–2500 B.C.E.) Iberia are some of the most enigmatic expressions of prehistoric European art, capturing the imagination of the public and archaeologists alike during the past century. Thousands of these hand-size, perforated plaques have been found in Neolithic collective burials, and they are thought to have served as mnemonic, prestigious, or ritual objects, perhaps for specific individuals. Large numbers of plaques were initially experimentally replicated to answer questions related to the chaîne opératoire of their production. These experiments, however, also yielded valuable phenomenological information about the sensory—the haptic, olfactory, auditory, visual, and even gustatory—experience of plaque making. Some of the results of this research allow us to actually identify individual plaque makers in the archaeological record in certain cases and to better understand the emergence of organized craft production in early complex societies.