7 research outputs found
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A study of obsidian in prehistoric central and Eastern Europe, and it's trace element characterization. An analytically-based study of archaeological obsidian in Central and Eastern Europe, an investigation of obsidian sources in this area, and the characterization of these obsidians using neutron activation analysis.
Fieldwork in the Zemplen Mountain area of north-eastern
Hungary showed that there are at least eight geological
sources of obsidian here, five of which have obsidian of a
workable quality. There are a further three sources in the
Slovak Zemplen, all of which provide workable obsidian.
Sources in Central Slovakia are highly devitrified and not
useable, and reported sources in Rumania had been discounted
earlier (Nandris, 1975). Forty-six samples of obsidian
from the Zemplen sources, and 293 pieces from 87 archaeological
sites in Central and Eastern Europe, were analysed by neutron
activation analysis for 15 trace and two major elements.
The trace elements used included those which are geochemically
likely to show the greatest variation between different
obsidian sources, and which are not badly affected by
devitrification and hydration of the obsidian, for example
the rare earth elements. The analytical data was processed
using Cluster Analysis. 242 of the archaeological samples
came from Slovak sources, 22 from Hungarian sources, 9 from
Lipari and 5 from Melos. In addition, 6 samples were
tentatively assigned to Carpathian sources, and 9 could not
be assigned to any source. Obsidian from the Zemplen
Mountains was distributed up to a distance of approximately
480 km from the sources; it was used extensively in Slovakia
and Hungary and reached southern Poland, Austria, Moravia,
central Yugoslavia, north-east Italy and central Rumania.
Obsidian use in central and eastern Europe began in the
Mousterian period. The earliest pieces analysed were
Aurignacian and came from Hungarian sources. Later, in the
Gravettian, Slovakian sources began to be exploited and
remained predominant until obsidian use declined sharply in
the Later Neolithic, and Copper and Bronze Ages. The
Carpathian obsidian distribution overlaps with the Liparian
distribution at one site in north-east Italy. There is no
evidence for an overlap with Aegean or Near Eastern sources.
The rate of fall off of obsidian away from the sources
suggests a down-the-line trading mechanism
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Provenance and trade studies of archaeological stone artefacts and the development of characterization techniques.
Non-destructive provenancing of bluestone axe-heads in Britain
The authors present a new procedure for discovering where stone artefacts come from without having to cut a slice through them. The method is tested on axes of spotted dolerite bluestone from Preseli in Wales, source of monoliths at Stonehenge
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Mons Claudianus and the problem of the 'granito del foro': a geological and geochemical approach
Granito del foro is a distinctive igneous rock, in fact a granodiorite rather than a granite, long known and named for its use in buildings of the Roman Forum. Exactly what is it? Where does it come from? Where else was it used and not used? What does the granito del foro say about ownership and empire
Radioelement distribution in the Tertiary Lundy Granite (Bristol Channel, UK)
Abstract not available