Vila Nova de Foz Côa - Santa Comba
Chronology: Upper Paleolithic - Late Prehistory
It was the first Upper Paleolithic habitat site found and excavated in the Côa Valley, and it’s a central site to the understanding of Stone Age human occupation in the area. It’s located in a large fluvial platform on the Côa’s left shore. It is an area with a pronounced curve in the river due to the existence of a rhyolite lode that supplied raw material for tool production to the Upper Paleolithic inhabitants. The site revealed an occupation sequence with the highest density of lithic remains in the region. Occupation layers have been identified for the Late Gravettian, Solutrean and two phases of the Magdalenian. Excavation identified a 4 meter wide Gravettian habitat structure, rare in Southwestern Europe, located inside a natural or human-made depression. This structure comprised several utilization phases. Amongst the recovered remains, a small stone slab containing traces of incised engravings stands out. Vestiges of a Late Prehistory occupation (namely sherds) was also identified.