A seminar on historical quarry spaces, organized by the IGME (Spanish Geological and Mining Institute) last November in Madrid, led to the creation of the Interdisciplinary Table on Natural Stone and Historic Quarries, which was formally established on April 8, 2019.
This working platform aims to articulate different public institutions to create a figure of protection of quarry space from different points of view (historical, archaeological, heritage and documentary) to ensure the possibility of exploitation, for future interventions.
An interinstitutional working platform for the protection of historic quarries
The ICAC is one of the institutions present in this institutional body, along with other three research centres (IAPH, SIEMCALSA and INTROMAC), some Spanish universities (as the University of Granda or the University of Salamanca), cultural institutions (as ICOMOS or RABSF, among others) and different institutions from local, regional and national government (as IGME, IPCE or CSIC).
The researcher representing ICAC in this project is Anna Gutiérrez Garcia-Moreno, head of the Unity of Archaeometrical Studies at the ICAC and expert in quarries and the exploitation of stone in Antiquity, subjects on which she has published extensively. Related to ICAC, Begoña Soler Huertas (University of Murcia), associate researcher and member of ArPA research group, is also a member of the initiative.
The Interdisciplinary Table on Natural Stone and Historic Quarries will allow to discuss topics of special interest, such as research methodologies, the importance of multidisciplinary work teams, the use and return to society of quarry spaces –especially in the populations where they are located–, the arising presence of the productive sector in the field of culture, or the guarantee of historical quarries in the general plans of urban planning.
