Cup from Los Blanquizares de Lébor

Los Millares Society

Settlements that depended on the central setting of Los Millares at a second or third level of importance have elíte necropolis concentrated with some tholoi. Such elítes justify their position by means of different rites and symbols. Most of the population of the dependent settlements were buried in a wide scope of megalithic structures (dolmens), which are scattered around the territory, marking the cultivated land and approach roads to the seasonally exploited pastures. But we also find another type of burial in the Southeast, although exceptional and scarcely represented, natural caves such as the cave of Blanquizares de Lébor (in Murcia).

There has been found in grave goods luxury objects such as ceramic containers with symbolic and Bell Beaker decorations. The symbolic pottery consisted of incised motifs such as sun-eyes, face tattoos or hair schemas, pointed triangles an deer. These motifs are also found in schematic cave painting and idols, and have been associated with sex opposition.

In this case, we have one cup with high walls and a slightly convex profile, closed rim, straight lip, convex background and flat base. The walls are thick and uneven in height with a rough inside finish. The outside is polished and decorated with two colours of paint. The decoration consists of ten thick smoothly zigzagging lines covering the perimeter of the vessel in parallel and in a chromatic alternation which combines fives lines in reddish-brown with five other - almost imperceptible - shades of orange.
The composition culminates in a straight reddish brown rib around the rim. Below the rim are two regular perforations, one opposite the other, intended for holding the cup. There are superficial losses of material and a wide vertical crack in the rim.

Material: Alabaster, pigment
Dimensions: Maximum height 8,90 cm; Base diameter 11,70 cm; Mouth diameter 8,80 cm; Edge: Thickness 0,70 cm
Provenance: Los Blanquizares de Lébor,Totana (Murcia): Burial cave/Unknown
Excavation,1928, Cuadrado Ruiz, Juan