scholarly journals The smelting of copper in the third millennium cal BC Trentino, north-eastern Italy

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Pearce ◽  
Stephen Merkel ◽  
Andreas Hauptmann ◽  
Franco Nicolis
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Copper Smelting ◽  
Smelting Process ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Copper Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
North Eastern ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Matte Smelting ◽  
Rock Shelters

Abstract This paper presents observations and analyses on seven slag pieces from two third-millennium cal BC (Late Copper Age/Early Bronze Age) rock shelters in the Trentino, north-eastern Italy: La Vela di Valbusa and the Riparo di Monte Terlago. We review previous work on contemporary slags from the region and show that the smelting did not follow the well-known ‘Timna’, ‘Eibner’ or so-called ‘Chalcolithic’ copper smelting processes. We show that ethnographic accounts of copper smelting in the Himalayas (Sikkim and Nepal) illuminate the smelting process, in particular the lack of preliminary roasting or ore beneficiation by washing, the use of slags as fluxes for the first smelt (matte smelting) and the use of wooden (?) implements to lift the hot slags from the furnace during the smelt. The rock inclusions in the slag are consistent with an ore origin from mines at Calceranica or Vetriolo, as previously reported in the literature.

The Early Bronze Age in Southeastern Anatolia

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Tuba Ökse
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Third Millennium Bce

This article presents data on the Early Bronze Age (EBA) of southeastern Anatolia. The EBA chronology of southeastern Anatolia is parallel to northern Syrian chronologies. The traditional EBA I-III chronology of Anatolia is based on the Tarsus sequence and the EBA I-IV chronology of northwestern Syria on the Amuq and Tell Mardikh sequences. The distribution of ceramic groups and special vessel types reflects geographical and chronological differences throughout the third millennium BCE. The relative chronologies of geographical zones and individual periods are based mainly on ceramic distributions; absolute dates obtained from radiocarbon analyses are rare.

The Development of Embossed Goldwork in Bronze Age Europe

2000 ◽  
Vol 80 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Needham
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
The Other ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
Parallel Development ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Third Millennium Bc ◽  
Craft Skills

The discovery of a pair of armlets from Lockington and the re-dating of the Mold cape, add substance to a tradition of embossed goldworking in Early Bronze Age Britain. It is seen to be distinct in morphology, distribution and decoration from the other previously defined traditions of goldworking of the Copper and Early Bronze Ages, which are reviewed here. However, a case is made for its emergence from early objects employing ‘reversible relief to execute decoration and others with small-scale corrugated morphology. Emergence in the closing stages of the third millennium BC is related also to a parallel development in the embossing of occasional bronze ornaments. Subsequent developments in embossed goldwork and the spread of the technique to parts of the Continent are summarized. The conclusions address the problem of interpreting continuity of craft skills against a very sparse record of relevant finds through time and space.

Migration and ethnicity in prehistoric Cyprus: Technology ashabitus

2000 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Frankel
Keyword(s):  
Technology Transfer ◽  
Material Culture ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Culture Change ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Cultural System ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Technology And Economy ◽  
Culture Technology

During the third millennium cal BC, there were major changes in many aspects of Cypriot material culture, technology and economy which characterize the division between the Chalcolithic and early Bronze Age on the island. Many innovations can be traced to Anatolian antecedents. These include a very wide array of domestic as well as agricultural and industrial technologies. Their nature and range make it possible to argue strongly for the movement of people to the island, rather than for other mechanisms of technology transfer and culture change. This identification of an intrusive group, with distinctive patterns of behaviour (habitus), opens up questions of prehistoric ethnicity, and the processes by which the initial maintenance of different lifeways by indigenous and settler communities eventually gave way to a common cultural system.

Excess in precipitation as a cause for settlement decline along the Israeli coastal plain during the third millennium BC

2007 ◽  
Vol 68 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Avraham Faust ◽  
Yosef Ashkenazy
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Coastal Plain ◽  
Arable Land ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Human Settlement ◽  
The Third ◽  
Arid Conditions ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Third Millennium Bc

AbstractAlthough the relations between climate and settlement are not straightforward, there is a general agreement that arid conditions are less favorable for human settlement in the semiarid Near East than humid conditions. Here we show that humid conditions resulted in the abandonment of settlements along the Israeli coastal plain. We first present archaeological evidence for a drastic decline in settlement along the Israeli coast during most of the third millennium BC (Early Bronze Age II–III). Then, based on archaeological and climatic evidence, we link this decline to an environmental change occurring at that time. We propose that increased precipitation intensified the already existing drainage problems and resulted in flooding, which led to the transformation of arable land into marshes and to the spread of diseases, gradually causing settlement decline and abandonment.

ВОПРОСЫ АБСОЛЮТНОЙ ХРОНОЛОГИИ ЭПОХИ РАННЕЙ БРОНЗЫ СЕВЕРНОГО КАВКАЗА

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Rezepkin ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
North Caucasus ◽  
The Third ◽  
The North ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Third Millennium Bc ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
Archaeological Analysis ◽  
Two Peaks

There are two points of view on the absolute chronology of the Early Bronze Age of the North Caucasus: this era occupies the entire of the fourth millennium and the beginning of the third millennium BC, or only the second half of the fourth millennium and the beginning of the third millennium BC. Collected 102 dates and statistically processed. We managed to identify two peaks (concentrations) of dates. In the future, these peaks will be subjected to their own archaeological analysis.

Reconstructing prehistoric metallurgical knowledge: the northern Italian Copper and Bronze Ages

1998 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Pearce
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Northern Italy ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Copper Age ◽  
Chemical Analyses ◽  
Metal Working ◽  
The Third ◽  
Arsenical Copper

The paper attempts to integrate the results of chemical analyses, which are seriously underused in archaeological discourse, with other classes of information in order to try to interpret ancient metal working behaviour and knowledge within a semiotic framework, adopting the modernist premise that ancient metalworking was both rational and deliberate. A number of case studies from northern Italy is discussed. In the first it is noted that in the Copper Age Remedello culture arsenical copper was used for halberds and daggers while purer copper was used for flat axes; it is suggested that this distinction reflects deliberate choice and explanations are offered for it. The second case study regards the interpretation of the Pieve Albignola early Bronze Age axe hoard; evidence for the workshop practices of ancient bronzesmiths and for the use of axe preforms as ingots is discussed. The third case study concerns the swords and daggers of the middle and recent Bronze Age; finds context (tombs and wetlands) are discussed and it is suggested that metal analyses may indicate that sometimes these artefacts are not primarily functional.

The Early Bronze Age stone figurines from Akrotiri on Thera and their significance for the Early Cycladic settlement

1998 ◽  
Vol 93 ◽  
pp. 107-165
Author(s):  
Panayiota Sotirakopoulou
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
Third Millennium Bc

The recent excavations at Akrotiri on Thera have brought to light 21 new EC figurines which, taken together with those already known or completely unknown, raise the number of EC figurines from the site of 37. The Akrotiri figurines comprise a wide range of types, both schematic and naturalistic, covering almost the whole of the known EC sculptural repertoire and also introduce types which are entirely new. Thus they constitute a significant body of evidence, for the following reasons: first, because they show unmistakably the importance of the settlement at Akrotiri already in the third millennium BC; second, because, by contrast with most EC figurines, they come from a systematic excavation; and third, because, including types and showing features up until now rarely seen or even completely unknown in the Cyclades and the Aegean, they enrich our knowledge of EC figurative sculpture and offer us the possibility of drawing a number of inferences.

Two Early Helladic II terracotta rollers from Asine and their glyptic context

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 81-96
Author(s):  
Michael Lindblom ◽  
Gullög Nordquist ◽  
Hans Mommsen
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Chemical Characterization ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
Archaeological Perspective

Two Early Helladic II terracotta rollers from the Third Terrace at Asine are presented. The objects, used to impress relief decoration on pithoi and hearths, are unique in that no other examples are known from the Early Bronze Age Aegean. Their origin is discussed based on chemical characterization and their depositional contexts are reviewed from an archaeological perspective. Although there are no known impressions from these rollers on pithoi and hearths at Asine, it is shown that their owners surrounded themselves with different objects featuring similar glyptic impressions. Two such impressions find identical parallels at Tiryns and the combined evidence strongly suggest that Asine was the home for one or several potters who produced Early Helladic impressed hearths and pithoi.

Dairy Queen. Churns and milk products in the Aegean Bronze Age

2014 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 205-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah P. Morris
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Dairy Products ◽  
Near East ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Specific Function ◽  
Milk Products ◽  
The Third ◽  
Household Processing

This article assembles examples of an unusual vessel found in domestic contexts of the Early Bronze Age around the Aegean and in the Eastern Mediterranean. Identified as a “barrel vessel” by the excavators of Troy, Lesbos (Thermi), Lemnos (Poliochni), and various sites in the Chalkidike, the shape finds its best parallels in containers identified as churns in the Chalcolithic Levant, and related vessels from the Eneolithic Balkans. Levantine parallels also exist in miniature form, as in the Aegean at Troy, Thermi, and Poliochni, and appear as part of votive figures in the Near East. My interpretation of their use and development will consider how they compare to similar shapes in the archaeological record, especially in Aegean prehistory, and what possible transregional relationships they may express along with their specific function as household processing vessels for dairy products during the third millennium BC.

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