L'Origen de l'arquitectura en pedra i l'urbanisme a la Catalunya Occidental

The consolidation of an agricultural economy based in extensive cereals production influenced the development of the typical communities of the plains of western Catalonia during the second millennium BC and the first centuries of the first and differentiated them from the villages of the coast. This paper analyzes the occupation and exploitation pattems of temtories, settlements and specially the development of stone architecture in the Bronze and Iron Age periods. We characterise the process that leads from the first open-air sedentary settlements to the agricultural settlements in early and middle Bronze Age period and the appearance of wellbuilt houses and town planning during the late Bronze Age. We can asses the contribution of the early Urnfield period and link the kind of settlement, the town plan, the architecture and building techniques - which centuries later characterised the Ibero-Ilergeta society - to their origin during the later Urnfield period: systematic exploitation of lands suitable for agriculture (Urgell, Monegros), the phenomenon of concentration-depopulation and the decrease in number of settlements combined with an increase in size.