Premium
Geophysical evidence for fires in antiquity: preliminary results from an experimental study. Paper given at the EGS XXIV General Assembly in The Hague, April 1999
Author(s) -
Linford N. T.,
Canti M. G.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
archaeological prospection
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.785
H-Index - 38
eISSN - 1099-0763
pISSN - 1075-2196
DOI - 10.1002/arp.170
Subject(s) - topsoil , magnetometer , geophysics , archaeomagnetic dating , geology , magnetic susceptibility , coercivity , soil water , mineralogy , mining engineering , archaeology , soil science , magnetic field , earth's magnetic field , geography , physics , condensed matter physics , quantum mechanics
The ubiquitous use of fire in antiquity has been identified as an important mechanism for the magnetic enhancement of archaeological sediments and their subsequent identification through the use of surface magnetometer or topsoil susceptibility surveys. However, despite a number of specific studies there remains little quantitative evidence to examine the effect of domestic fire on the magnetic properties of soils and estimate the degree of magnetic enhancement such processes may create. This study reports results from a series of experimental fires lit over a range of differing substrates to examine the geophysical response created by the fire and the magnetic enhancement of the underlying soil. In all cases, the temperature profile both in the air and soil was measured using an array of thermocouples and measurements of magnetic susceptibility demonstrate a varying degree of enhancement dependent upon the depth from the surface and underlying substrate. Initial results demonstrate the ‘softer’ (low coercivity) magnetic nature of the thermally enhanced soils owing to an increased concentration of very fine‐grained superparamagnetic material. It is hoped that more detailed magnetic measurements on both burnt and control samples collected before the fire was lit will reveal the critical temperatures required for significant magnetic enhancement to occur. Copyright © Crown Copyright 2001. Recorded with the the permission of Her Majesty's Stationery Office. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.