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THE ISOTOPIC COMPOSITION OF TIN IN SOME ANCIENT METALS AND THE RECYCLING PROBLEM IN METAL PROVENANCING
Author(s) -
GALE N. H.
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
archaeometry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.716
H-Index - 67
eISSN - 1475-4754
pISSN - 0003-813X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-4754.1997.tb00791.x
Subject(s) - tin , bronze , bronze age , composition (language) , isotope analysis , metal , metallurgy , geology , archaeology , materials science , history , art , oceanography , literature
A recent suggestion that some ancient metallurgical processes might give rise to large changes (> 0.5%) in the isotopic composition of tin gave hope that it might be possible to identify ancient bronze samples which had undergone recycling and mixing processes. This paper describes a method for the analysis of the isotopic composition of tin by thermal ionization mass spectrometry and applies it to analyse a number of ancient bronzes and tin metal objects from the Bronze Age Mediterranean. No observable isotopic fractionation of tin was found above $0.1% in the ratio 122 Sn/ 116 . Consequently, either recycling of bronze in the Late Bronze Age Mediterranean was not so common as supposed, or the isotopic composition of tin is not fractionated by anthropogenic metallurgical processes to the extent predicted by the Bradford group.