9th Century BC Moat to Protect Phoenician Settlement Excavated in Spain

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https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/phoenician...

Archaeologists working at a in the Alicante province of Spain have just discovered a large moat. This emphasizes the defensive actions taken by the settlers against the hostility they faced when they lived on the Iberian coast between the 8th and 9th century BC.

The moat is one of the defensive features of the Phoenician settlement at the archaeological site of Cabezo Pequeño del Estaño (also known as Cabeço de l’Estany), located in the coastal town of Guardamar del Segura. A University of Alicante press release reports that the moat is three meters (9.84 ft.) deep and over eight meters (26.25 ft.) wide at the top. It was dug by hand and the chisel marks made by the ancient workers can still be seen in the rocky substratum even today.

Protective Features of the Phoenician Settlement

The archaeologists received clues to the moat’s existence by examining aerial photography , which suggested it was located on a hill parallel to the settlement’s walls. The moat itself was covered in an excess of soil, not only due to the passage of time, but possibly also because of ancient earthquakes and illegal quarrying at the site in 1988. Nonetheless, one of the archaeologists and site directors, Fernando Prados of the Instituto Universitario de Investigación en Arqueología y Patrimonio Histórico (INAPH)  of the University of Alicante, has called the moat “enormous and intact.”