The focus of my current research is to investigate how pre-historic populations interacted with the sea to obtain and manage coastal resources. What role did coastal adaptations play through the transition from the last hunter-gatherers and the arrival of the first farmers? I use a geoarchaeological approach, combining microstratigraphic and geochemical techniques in the study of Mesolithic and Neolithic coastal sites, particularly shell middens, in the Atlantic shores of Iberia. These are excellent sedimentary archives of human behaviours towards the coast, and of indirect evidence for environmental changes as well. I use these techniques also to reconstruct site formation processes and to explore geoarchaeological evidence for the first agricultural practices, to understand the contact mechanisms between the last hunter-gatherers and the first farmers.

I am a keen geoarchaeologist, with an interdisciplinary and international training, currently holding a Widening Fellowship from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme to develop the SEArch project at ICArEHB. I graduated in Archaeology at the Nova University of Lisbon and earn a master’s degree in Quaternary Science from the University of the Basque Country. Thanks to a fellowship from the Spanish Ministry of Economy, I completed my PhD in Prehistoric Archaeology at the University of Cantabria, in 2019, on the formation of Mesolithic shell middens. As a geoarchaeologist and micromorphologist, I collaborate in ICArEHB projects such as FLAME and Lapa do Picareiro, as well as other interdisciplinary teams investigating the prehistoric past in Portugal and Spain, where I am focused on site formation processes reconstruction.

For my complete CV please click HERE

• Simões, C.D., A.F. Carvalho, C. Tente (2020). Neolithic geoarchaeology at Penedo dos Mouros Rockshelter: Mid-Holocene site formation, diagenesis and human activity at the foothills of Serra da Estrela (Portugal). Geoarchaeology 35: 503-521. doi: 10.1002/gea.21785 Link

• Simões, C.D., P. Rebelo, N. Neto, J.L. Cardoso (2020). Lisboa no Neolítico Antigo: resultados das escavações no Palácio Ludovice. Estudos Arqueológicos de Oeiras 26: 11-40. Link

• Duarte, C., E. Iriarte, M. Diniz and P. Arias (2019). The microstratigraphic record of human activities and formation processes at the Mesolithic shell midden of Poças de São Bento (Sado Valley, Portugal). Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences 11: 483-509. doi: 10.1007/s12520-017-0519-0.  Link

• Villagran, X.S., L.C.R. Pessenda, H.A.V. CostaI, T. AtorreI, I.d.S. Erler, A. Strauss, A. Barioni, D. Klökler, A. TognoliI, C. Duarte, P.V. Bonfim, K. Macario (2018). Os primeiros povoadores do litoral norte do Espírito Santo: uma nova abordagem na arqueologia de sambaquis capixabas. The first settlers on the northern coast of Espírito Santo: a new approach to shell mound (sambaqui) archaeology. Bol. Mus. Para. Emílio Goeldi. Cienc. Hum. 13: 573-596. doi: 10.1590/1981.81222018000300006 Link

• Carvalho, A.F., V. Pereira, C. Duarte and C. Tente (2017). Neolithic archaeology at the Penedo dos Mouros rock-shelter (Gouveia, Portugal) and the issue of primitive transhumance practices in the Estrela Mountain range. ZEPHYRVS 79: 19-38. Link

• Arias, P., M. Diniz, M. Cubas, C. Duarte, E. Iriarte, C. Salzmann, F. Teichner and L. Teira (2017). Looking for the traces of the last hunter–gatherers: Geophysical survey in the Mesolithic shell middens of the Sado valley (southern Portugal). Quaternary International, 435(Part B): 61-70.  Link

• Duarte, C.; A.M. Costa, V. Aldeias (2017). Reconstruir atividades humanas e formação de contextos conquíferos: microfácies sedimentares do Cabeço da Amoreira (Muge) e das Poças de São Bento (Sado) e o seu potencial interpretativo nos padrões de comportamento humano no Mesolítico. In José Morais Arnaud & Andrea Martins, eds. – Arqueologia em Portugal 2017 – Estado da Questão. Lisboa: Associação dos Arqueólogos Portugueses, p. 419-432.

• Duarte, C., E. Iriarte, M. Diniz, P. Arias (2015). Chapter XXIV: High resolution XRF Chemostratigraphy of the Poças de São Bento shell midden (Sado Valley). In Muge 150th: The 150th Anniversary of the Discovery of Mesolithic Shellmiddens. Nuno Bicho, Cleia Detry, T. Douglas Price and Eugénia Cunha (Eds.). Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 333-345.

Current project:
• SEArch – Sea harvesting in the transition from hunter-gatherer to farmer societies. Archaeological microscopic and molecular approaches.
Funding: European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program
Supervisor: Dr. Vera Aldeias