Archaeometry and Materials Analysis
Archaeometry applies the physical and chemical sciences to archaeological materials, characterizing what objects are made of, where their raw materials came from, and how they were produced.
Definition
The application of analytical chemistry, physics, and materials science to archaeological objects and residues in order to determine their composition, technology, and origin.
Scope
This area covers the analytical study of archaeological materials: the composition and microstructure of ceramics, metals, glass, stone, and organic remains; provenance studies that source raw materials; residue and biomolecular analyses; and isotopic methods. It treats the instrumentation and quantitative reasoning by which laboratory data are turned into archaeological interpretation.
Sub-topics
Core questions
- What are archaeological objects made of, and how were they manufactured?
- Where did the raw materials come from, and what does that reveal about exchange?
- What analytical techniques characterize ancient materials and residues?
- How are instrumental data translated into reliable archaeological interpretation?
Key theories
- Compositional provenance
- The principle that the chemical or isotopic 'fingerprint' of a material can be matched to geological sources, allowing archaeologists to reconstruct procurement and exchange of obsidian, metals, clays, and stone.
- Technological characterization
- The study of microstructure and composition to reconstruct ancient manufacturing processes, such as firing temperatures of ceramics or the smelting and alloying of metals.
History
Scientific analysis of artifacts has roots in 19th-century chemistry, but archaeometry coalesced after World War II with the founding of laboratories such as Oxford's Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the journal Archaeometry. The spread of instrumental techniques, from spectrometry to mass spectrometry, made compositional, provenance, and biomolecular studies central to modern archaeological science.
Debates
- Linking laboratory data to past behavior
- Critics argue that analytical sophistication can outpace archaeological interpretation, prompting debate about how compositional and isotopic data should be sampled, statistically treated, and tied to human activity.
Key figures
- A. Mark Pollard
- Carl Heron
- Michael Tite
- Colin Renfrew
Related topics
Seminal works
- pollardheron2008
- pollardetal2007
- tite1972
Frequently asked questions
- What is archaeometry?
- Archaeometry is the use of scientific methods from chemistry, physics, and materials science to analyze archaeological objects, determining their composition, technology, age, and origin.
- How can analysis tell where an object came from?
- Many raw materials carry distinctive chemical or isotopic signatures tied to their geological source, so matching an artifact's composition to source data can reveal where its material originated.