ABSTRACT
During 1937, the unconventional, symmetrical war of the previous months mutated into total war, with both sides deploying hundreds of thousands of soldiers in the field, backed by airplanes, tanks and artillery. The landscape of conflict and its materiality at large changed. Some of the most memorable battles of the Spanish Civil War, from Jarama to Teruel, took place or began in 1937. This was also the year in which the Northern Front collapsed, putting the Republic in a dire situation. This chapter summarizes archaeological research conducted in the Jarama area, the Basque Country, Asturias and the mountains of León and Castile. War in the North is particularly interesting from an archaeological point of view, as its materiality is remarkably different from other scenarios, a phenomenon that has to do with vernacular traditions, peripheral nationalism and the military isolation of the North, which was cut off from the rest of Republican territory. The chapter also describes work that we have carried out in one of the lieux de mémoire of the Spanish Civil War: Belchite. The town was besieged and finally captured by the Republicans during a failed offensive against Zaragoza (one of Spain’s major cities in the hand of the Nationalists). It was presented at the time as a glorious victory by the Republic and as an epic act of resistance by the Nationalists. The fact that Franco decided to preserve the town as a memorial of the war—a sort of Oradour-sûr-Glâne avant la lettre—further projected the myths into the future. We carried out our research both inside Belchite and in the surroundings, where major (and largely forgotten) battles were fought in August and September 1937.
