Speaker
Dr
Katalin T. Biró
(Hungarian National Museum)
Description
The application of large scale facility analytical techniques in archaeology, especially that of non-destructive methods has important new results in Hungary due to recent National Research Development and Innovation Projects. The objects investigated include various categories of cultural heritage including prehistoric finds (lithic artefacts, pottery, metal etc) and finds from more recent periods including glass as well. The present lecture will summarize new achievements on the field of lithic analysis using neutron techniques. The basic question for lithic analysis is provenancing, i.e., identifying the geological source of archaeological implements by the help of scientific techniques. For this purpose we need representative comparative material and wide geological, geochemical knowledge on the source areas. Some of the raw material categories are relatively easy to characterise and supply important and directly relevant data for archaeologists; some categories, however, are difficult to interpret and need more analytical work, sometimes complementary methodology.
The selection of these techniques should consider the following aspects:
- they should be, preferentially, non-destructive.
- the features observed (e.g. range of elements measured) should be complementary
- the categories (groups) distinguished should be evaluated using simple and clear statistical techniques
Primary authors
Dr
Katalin T. Biró
(Hungarian National Museum)
Dr
Zsolt Kasztovszky
(MTA Centre for Energy Research)
