Las canteras históricas de la Sierra de Carrascoy (Murcia). Estudio preliminar del área extractiva de Mayayo

Laburpena

In the foothills of the Sierra de Carrascoy, adjacent to the districts of El Palmar and Sangonera la Verde, there is a group of inactive mining fronts traditionally known as the Mayayo quarries. Linked to the factory of the Cathedral of Murcia since the late 15th century, its fronts have supplied construction material to some of the major building projects undertaken in this city until well into the 20th century. The historiography informs about the existence of bioclastic limestone banks in the area, in which different varieties were benefited according to their colouring, quality and degree of compaction. However, there are no studies regarding the quarry, the geological nature and extension of the benefited levels, or the periodization of their productive cycles. In this context, we decided to undertake a first approach to the quarry in order to evaluate the entity of the extractive work, among other evidences related to the exploitation, transformation and transport of its productions, whose results we will deal with in this presentation.