Warrior of falcata II. Sculptural group of Cerrillo Blanco (Porcuna, Jaén, Spain)

Exempt sculpture. He represents a warrior in a fighting position, leaning forward. She is dressed in a short robe, with V-neckline fitted to the body with a faldellín at the height of the hips and another skirt in which the folds are marked perfectly in front and back. The robe is fitted with a wide belt of three reinforcements. As for the military clothing, it presents certain features similar to those of the Guerrero sculpture of the double armor, such as the spiral ribbon formed on the side of the helmet and two small holes, one of them rectangular. In this sculpture we can see the union of the two bands that decorate the helmet on the back of the head, as well as part of the helmet’s plume. The chest is protected by a large armor, attached by strap to a smaller one located on the right shoulder. In the back he has another disco-breastplate attached to the previous ones by straps. On the right hip is preserved part of the sheath of a triangular shape dagger and very elongated. Chronology: 450-400 B.C. Dimensions Height = 79.5 cm Width = 44 cm Maximum thickness = 43 cm This figure together with the falcata I warrior would form a scene within the group of struggles, the wider and more complex group of the whole group. War defines the space and time of aristocratic representation. The war is conceived as a sum of individual or monomachian fighting. In Porcuna we collect five cases of duels that together constitute an authentic seriation of the usual scenes of a single duel: in one the defeated rider is standing; has released the shield when receiving the impact of a falcata on his body, in another the rider has fallen and raises his arm to grab the leg of the winning warrior, the third scene is this in which the character lying on the ground touched of death because a spear crosses him from the face to l However, it is not the dismissal of a mourning because the deaths of the defeated are different: with falcata wound on the left side of the trunk, with spear on the face or with wound on the right shoulder, on the contrary they are different duels that refer to some collective fact that can respond to a ritual of games of fight with death or to the narration of a past fact that were protagonists the adult warriors of the lineage. It is significant that almost all of the heads have been crushed when the monument was destroyed. The faces of both groups, victors and defeated, have been meticulously shattered, reflecting a deep aristocratic conception: if both groups have the right to memory, destruction affects both equally. The glory of the victor does not exist without his mirror of the defeated: both are heroes and complement each other. Currently the sculptures from Cerrillo Blanco can be visited in the Provincial Museum of Jaén and the archeological site in Porcuna (Jaén) is also visible, since it is one of the stops of the cultural route “Journey to the time of the Iberos” with which it is intended to value the iberas first level traces existing in the province of Jaén. Bibliography: Torrecillas, J. F. (1985): The late period cemetery of Cerrillo Blanco. Institute of Giennenses Studies. Jaén. Olmos, R. (2002): “The sculptural groups of Cerrillo Blanco de Porcuna (Jaén). A convergent iconographic reading essay.” Spanish Archive of Archaeology, 75 107-122. Chapa, T. (2015): “Los escultores del Cerrillo Blanco de Porcuna,” in A. Ruiz y M. Molinos (coord.): Jaén, ibera land. 40 years of research and transfer. University of Jaén. Jaén. Ruiz, A. and Molinos, M. (2015): “The sculptural group of Cerrillo Blanco, Porcuna,” in A. Ruiz and M. Molinos (Eds.): Jaén, Iberian land 40 Years of research and transfer. University of Jaén. 67-84.