Archaeometallurgy is the study of the past use and production of metals by humans. It is a sub-discipline of

archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

and archaeological science.

Uses

Archaeometallurgical study has many uses in both the

chemical A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., wi ...

and

anthropological Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavi ...

fields. Analysis contributes valuable insights into many archaeological questions, from technological choice to social organisation. Any project concerned with the relationship that the human species has had to the metals known to us is an example of archaeometallurgical study.

Methods

There are various methodological approaches to archaeometallurgical studies. The same methods used in

analytical chemistry Analytical chemistry studies and uses instruments and methods to separate, identify, and quantify matter. In practice, separation, identification or quantification may constitute the entire analysis or be combined with another method. Separati ...

may be used to analyze artifacts. Chemical analysis methods may include the analysis of

mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementar ...

density Density (volumetric mass density or specific mass) is the substance's mass per unit of volume. The symbol most often used for density is ''ρ'' (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter ''D'' can also be used. Mathematical ...

chemical composition A chemical composition specifies the identity, arrangement, and ratio of the elements making up a compound. Chemical formulas can be used to describe the relative amounts of elements present in a compound. For example, the chemical formula for ...

. Most methods are non-destructive in nature, such as

X-ray spectroscopy X-ray spectroscopy is a general term for several spectroscopic techniques for characterization of materials by using x-ray radiation. Characteristic X-ray spectroscopy When an electron from the inner shell of an atom is excited by the energy o ...

, or micro-destructive (requiring removal of only a tiny portion of the sample). Non-destructive methods can be used on more artefacts than destructive ones, but because they operate at the surface of the metal, corrosion and other surface effects may interfere with the results. Options that include sampling include various forms of

mass spectrometry Mass spectrometry (MS) is an analytical technique that is used to measure the mass-to-charge ratio of ions. The results are presented as a ''mass spectrum'', a plot of intensity as a function of the mass-to-charge ratio. Mass spectrometry is use ...

and a variety of chemical tests.

Modern to ancient

One of the methods of archaeometallurgy is the study of modern metals and

alloys An alloy is a mixture of chemical elements of which at least one is a metal. Unlike chemical compounds with metallic bases, an alloy will retain all the properties of a metal in the resulting material, such as electrical conductivity, ductility, ...

to explain and understand the use of metals in the past. A study conducted by the department of Particle Physics and Astrophysics at Weizmann Institute of Science and the department of Archaeology at the University of Haifia analyzed the chemical composition and the mass of different denominations of

Euro The euro ( symbol: €; code: EUR) is the official currency of 19 out of the member states of the European Union (EU). This group of states is known as the eurozone or, officially, the euro area, and includes about 340 million citizens . ...

coinage. They concluded that even with modern standards and technology, there is a considerable variation within the "same" denomination of coin.. This simple conclusion can be used to further analyze discoveries of ancient currency.

Non-ferrous archaeometallurgy

The specific study of the

non-ferrous metals In metallurgy, non-ferrous metals are metals or alloys that do not contain iron (allotropes of iron, ferrite, and so on) in appreciable amounts. Generally more costly than ferrous metals, non-ferrous metals are used because of desirable proper ...

used in past. Gold, silver and copper were the first to be used by ancient humans. Gold and copper are both found in their '

native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and entert ...

' state in nature, and were thus the first to be exploited as they did not need to be smelted from their ores. They could be hammered into sheets or decorative shapes. The extraction of copper from its ores may have developed due to the attractive colouring and value of ores such as

malachite Malachite is a copper carbonate hydroxide mineral, with the formula Cu2CO3(OH)2. This opaque, green-banded mineral crystallizes in the monoclinic crystal system, and most often forms botryoidal, fibrous, or stalagmitic masses, in fractures ...

Ferrous archaeometallurgy

The specific study of the

ferrous In chemistry, the adjective Ferrous indicates a compound that contains iron(II), meaning iron in its +2 oxidation state, possibly as the divalent cation Fe2+. It is opposed to "ferric" or iron(III), meaning iron in its +3 oxidation state, such a ...

compounds (those including iron, Fe) used in the past. Iron metal was first encountered in

meteorites A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or moon. When the original object en ...

, and was later extracted from

iron ores Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the for ...

to create

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.08%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4%). It is a semi-fused mass of iron with fibrous slag Inclusion (mineral), inclusions (up to 2% by weight), which give it a ...

which was never fully molten, and later,

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...

. Iron combined with carbon formed

steel Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistant ty ...

, allowing people to develop superior tools and weapons from the

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

to the

industrial revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

History

After initial sporadic work, archaeometallurgy was more widely institutionalised in the 1960s and 70s, with research groups in Britain (

The British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It documen ...

, the UCL Institute of Archaeology, the Institute for Archeo-Metallurgical Studies (iams)), Germany ( Deutsches Bergbau Museum) and the US (

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

and

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

). Specialisations within metallurgical focus on

metallography Metallography is the study of the physical structure and components of metals, by using microscopy. Ceramic and polymeric materials may also be prepared using metallographic techniques, hence the terms ceramography, plastography and, collectiv ...

of finished objects,

mineralogy Mineralogy is a subject of geology specializing in the scientific study of the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical (including optical) properties of minerals and mineralized artifacts. Specific studies within mineralogy include the proces ...

of waste products such as

slag Slag is a by-product of smelting (pyrometallurgical) ores and used metals. Broadly, it can be classified as ferrous (by-products of processing iron and steel), ferroalloy (by-product of ferroalloy production) or non-ferrous/base metals (by-prod ...

and manufacturing studies.

References

External links

The Historical Metallurgy Society

IAMS
offered two courses in 2012: *
Prehistoric Metallurgy
by Simon Timberlake and Fergus Milton at

Butser Ancient Farm Butser Ancient Farm is an archaeological open-air museum and experimental archaeology site located near Petersfield, Hampshire, Petersfield in Hampshire, southern England. Butser features experimental reconstructions of prehistoric, Romano-Britis ...

.
Yale University Archaeometallurgy Laboratory
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