The first peoples of the Peninsula — History, 11–13
How communities lived before Portugal existed — from gatherers to hillfort peoples — and what settling down changed.
Gatherers and farmer-herders
Before any kingdoms existed, the Iberian Peninsula was home to gathering communities, who moved around in search of food — hunting, fishing, wild fruit. Later, some communities became farmer-herders: they grew crops and raised animals, which let them settle in one place. In the north-west of the peninsula, these settled communities built fortified hilltop settlements called castros.
Why settling down changed everything
Moving from searching for food to growing it in one place might sound like a small step, but it demanded far more cooperation between people: storing seeds for next year, sharing tasks, defending land and harvests. This process created the foundations of life in society as we know it — villages, hierarchies, and ever more regular exchanges between communities.
A case: a castro settlement
Step 1: a farmer-herder people chooses a hilltop, easy to defend and close to water and fertile land. Step 2: it builds a stone wall around round stone houses, grouped along narrow streets. Step 3: several families live inside the castro, farming nearby fields, raising livestock and exchanging goods with neighbouring peoples. Step 4: over time, the castro grows and becomes a local centre of power.
The trap: assuming it was simple
It's easy to picture these communities as simple groups with no organisation. But excavations at castro sites show carefully built walls, houses with separate rooms, and objects from far away — a sign of trade. Like any society, they had their own rules, hierarchies and ways of making decisions, just without writing to record them.
Where you can still see this today
You can visit real castros in Portugal — the Citânia de Briteiros, near Guimarães, is one of the best known, with streets, houses and walls still visible. Local museums hold objects found in these excavations, a direct way to see how people lived in those times.
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