Methodology and Archaeometry

The present study sheds new light on the alterations of archaeological ceramics buried in marine environments by analysing in detail a large dataset of Hellenistic and Late Roman Republican transport amphorae from 15 sites along the well-known ancient maritime trade route of the Dalmatian coast in southern Croatia. The analysis included amphorae from shipwrecks, kiln sites and settlements. In this multiple site investigation, the ceramic petrography and bulk geochemical analysis by Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis have been used to directly compare, for the first time, sherds that have a common origin, but were buried in different environments, marine and terrestrial. This has permitted the identification of changes in ceramic microstructure as well as alterations of chemical elements that were either enriched or depleted in the amphorae from shipwrecks relative to those from land burials. The findings of the study are discussed in terms of the provenance determination of ceramics from submerged environments that can set a framework for reconstruction of ancient maritime trade routes.

This pilot study forms part of an interdisciplinary research project being carried out on finds from Agriomernos Cave (Seitani) in northwest Samos Island, Greece, which have produced important evidence for use during at least two different chronological episodes, the Final Neolithic (late 4th mill. BC) and the Middle Bronze Age (early 2nd mill. BC). In the framework of this wider project, this paper presents some preliminary results from the petrographic analysis of a recently discovered ceramic assemblage. Petrographic results, combined with macroscopic and typological data, have revealed a diverse ceramic assemblage in terms of clay composition and provenance. While most of the pottery was produced locally, using a range of different raw material sources, potential imports from the south coast of Samos and secure off-island imports have also been identified based on their petrological signature. The mineralogical data are compared with already established groupings from previous analysis of Final Neolithic/Chalcolithic, as well as Early and Middle Bronze Age pottery from the Heraion and Tigani settlements, located in south-central Samos. This aims at reconstructing manufacturing traditions diachronically, as well as intra-island and inter-Aegean communication and mobility during prehistory. This picture adds to already existing analytical data on the production and circulation of Neolithic pottery in caves around the Aegean, such as Euripides Cave on Salamina (Saronic Gulf), Cyclops Cave on Youra, Aghios Efstratios and Ayio Gala on Chios (northeast Aegean). The Seitani Cave constitutes a key archaeological site at an area that has largely remained unexplored and it offers a unique opportunity to evaluate a sealed and securely-dated ceramic assemblage with strong typological and stylistic parallels from the nearby islands and western Anatolian littoral.

Uncovered in 1996 during the building of a road, the archaeological site of Žuta Lokva, Croatia has been excavated until 2003. The remains of a building with two phases were uncovered, along with ceramic finds dating from the beginning of the 1st Century AD to the middle of the 2nd Century AD. Excavations show that the site was a permanent roadside station on one of the busiest roads from the Adriatic coast towards the inland of the Roman province Dalmatia. Most of the sherds unearthed at Žuta Lokva belong to Roman kitchenware, indicating that main activity at the roadside station was serving food and accommodation to Roman travellers. The aim of this research is to determine the provenance of the kitchenware found at Žuta Lokva, using ceramic petrography and chemical analyses, and compare the results with neighbouring pottery workshops. This will help to answer questions, such as whether Žuta Lokva potters produced their own kitchenware, and the site functioned as an independent roadside station, or if the local community imported wares from the neighbouring workshop in Crikvenica, ancient Ad Turres on the coast. The 61 sherds, provided by the Institute of Archaeology in Zagreb for analysis, vary in terms of style, decoration and clay type. Ceramic petrography and portable X-Ray fluorescence were used to further characterise the sherds and group them by fabric. Through the integration of instrumental methods, it is possible to identify the chemical composition and microstructural components of the sherds, in turn allowing the interpretation of provenance. By using SEM-EDS, I also hope to answer technological questions, specifically paste preparation, clay recipes and firing processes.

The site of Nadin is a large Liburnian hillfort settlement near Zadar, Croatia, occupied by the indigenous community of Liburnians. Intensive seafaring promoted the development of the Iron Age Liburnian culture, which in its later phase, from (4th-1st c. BCE), is characterised by a strong Hellenistic influence, reflected in the mortuary architecture and imported Hellenistic pottery. Significant numbers of large (1mx1m) storage jars known as Pithoi (Greek) or Dolia (Roman), have been excavated at Nadin and other neighbouring Liburnian Iron age settlements. These storage jars were used predominantly for domestic storage of grains and foodstuffs in the settlements and have been found alongside kitchenware and imported Daunian Mattpainted ware from Southern Italy. In studies of ancient ceramics, it is usually assumed that such large storage vessels were produced locally due to the effort involved in their transport. However, pithoi have been reported from several shipwrecks in the Adriatic may have been imported from production sites in Apulia, Southern Italy. In order to address if they are produced locally, the provenance of 23 Liburnian pithoi sherds excavated from Nadin is being investigated compositionally in the present project, an MSc dissertation at UCL Institute of Archaeology, using a combination of macroscopic fabric analysis, thin section petrography and geochemistry. This presentation will present the initial findings of the study including ceramic petrography, portable X-Ray fluorescence (pXRF) and the further research planned. Data collected non-destructively via pXRF will be explored and compared to existing data on pithoi from Apulia. The project seeks to contribute to our knowledge of Iron Age trade networks within the Adriatic.

At two sites in northern Croatia, late Starčevo pottery was found together with sherds of a regional variant of Linearbandkeramik (LBK) pottery, known as Korenovo. Although these contexts have not been dated directly, the apparent coexistence of Starčevo and LBK motifs would indicate a date in the 54th century cal BC, roughly coinciding with the start of the Vinča culture in Serbia. We report the first results of archaeometric analyses of Korenovo sherds from Malo Korenovo and Kaniška Iva, in the context of results from Starčevo, Vinča and early LBK pottery from the surrounding region. Although Korenovo pottery was locally made, like Starčevo pottery from the same sites, and superficially resembles LBK pottery, technologically it has more in common with early Vinča pottery, reflecting the complex dynamics of this transitional period.

Innovation comprises a question of particular interest in studies focused on production and technology of the archaeological material. Measuring the rate of transformation of material attributes could potentially explore a chain of important issues that regard manufacturing, production context, forms of exchange and market demand. It is indeed due to such potential that theoretical and methodological research on the matter has yielded some greatly beneficial outcome, especially in pottery studies. By taking advantage of these resources, in this paper, I focus on the measuring of the innovation degree of pottery material from late prehistoric southern Illyria (modern Albania). The object of my analysis is the pottery from three consecutive late prehistoric periods: Late Bronze, Early and Developed Iron Age. In diachronic order, for each pottery repertoire, I seek to explore to what extent features classified as inherited, innovative, and extinct change quantitatively and how this could reflect the dynamics of production in terms of market demand and degree of exchange. I argue that the low level of innovative features, as opposed to those inherited, must be considered a robust indicator that the late prehistoric pottery technology in southern Illyria remains clogged in the domain of a household production developed within a self-subsistent economy that does not prevail in the context of a formal market exchange production.

The hilltop settlement at the site of Lobor - Majka Božja Gorska in Hrvatsko Zagorje has been in use since the Middle Bronze Age. The continuous building activity, as well as medieval and post-medieval burials, have disturbed the archaeological strata of the site to a great extent. Prehistoric and Antique layers suffered the most damage by later interventions. Antique and Late Antique pottery sherds are the most numerous finds but they are rarely found in an intact archaeological contexts. The comparison of the volume density of pottery finds (the number of sherds per excavated volume unit) on different parts of the site is a method used for its spatial analysis. The analysis focuses on the pottery finds from two trenches located almost at the opposite sides of the Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Mountain. The first one, south-east of the enclosure wall, was excavated in 2010, and the second one, north of the enclosure wall, in 2014. The number of pottery sherds found in 2014 exceeds the number found in 2010 by 50%, what is, however, not reflected in the weight of those sherds. Since sherds found in 2014 were very fragmented and of more refined production, the difference in weight is only 30%. Those results prove that the quantification of pottery sherds alone cannot be used for the determination of the settlement expansion and the definition of its borders. Since area density isn't as correct, due to the lack of depth data, volume density is a more accurate method of analyzing pottery distribution in a settlement or in an area where a settlement is suspected. The exact position of the Antique and Late Antique settlement in Lobor is still unknown and will be determined by the use of this method.

Determining the source of a stone raw material, for example, chert used for knapping or limestone for the building of a villa rustica can be very useful in enlightening the distribution networks of different types of raw material. One of the analyses that can help locate the sources is the petrographic analysis. This method, to an extent, allows us to identify the type and geological age of raw material used for an activity. This data can be a starting point in raw material provenance study, using geological maps of a potential area of procurement. However, petrographic analysis besides obvious advantages has some shortcomings, and its results are not always enough for answering specific archaeological questions. This presentation will show the advantages and limitations of the petrographic analysis in determining the archaeological raw material sources, with examples from prehistoric and Roman archaeological sites in Istria.

The Early Iron Age archaeological site of Cvinger near Dolenjske Toplice is located on a limestone hill above the Krka River valley between Dolenjske Toplice and Meniška vas. Recently it was a “test-site” within two EU projects, ENTRANS (HERA) and Iron Age Danube (Interreg DTP). One of the goals of both projects was to analyse the results of a multimethod geophysical survey, applied to detect iron-smelting complexes using a combination of magnetic method, magnetic susceptibility mapping, 2D resistance tomography and low-frequency electromagnetic method as well as geochemical analyses by the pXRF method. The magnetic survey outlined the area of the iron-smelting complex, which lies approx. 200m to the south of the hillfort on a natural saddle called Branževec. Smaller areas were also detected inside the settlement, which might represent the magnetic effects of remains of blacksmith workshops. The purpose of other geophysical methods was to provide complementary data on the archaeological contexts. All these geophysical data was later supplemented by the results of geochemical analyses by the pXRF method and measurements of the magnetic susceptibility of long profile running across the entire Cvinger hill with the settlement and iron-smelting complex in its central part. The purpose of geochemical analyses was to determine the degree of spatial correlation between geophysical anomalies that indicate ironworks activities and the chemical composition of soils in these areas. This might be considered as an initiative for using geochemical surveys with portable XRF instruments for the discovery of iron-smelting complexes around Early Iron Age hillforts in the Dolenjska karst region, where accessibility for geophysical measurements is very limited due to lush vegetation and variable surface morphology.

The dagger was discovered in the closed complex of Structure no. 5 near the village of Dubene, Karlovo Region, South Bulgaria. It is referred chronologically to the EBA III, according to the ceramic material and the C14 dates. The structure consists of positioned on the ancient terrain ceramic sherds, metal artefacts (daggers, a lidded silver box, a bronze knife, gold objects) and glass beads. All these were covered with the medium in size river stones, which made it a closed complex. Some of the discoveries find their parallels among other archaeological sites of the same period, but other – like the dagger in question – do not find exact analogues. This makes it important both from the archaeological point of view and for the technologies used during the second half of the EBA III. Some preliminary technological observations and analyses were carried out that placed even more questions before the scholars. This paper will present some SEM images, analytical data and commentaries that give some indications concerning the composition and structure of the dagger.

A comprehensive interdisciplinary approach is proposed by this project, involving a wide range of professionals to obtain a variety of new data on the Middle and early Upper Paleolithic of Croatia. Employing both field and laboratory work, the project will shed new light on human biocultural evolution in south Central Europe and Central Mediterranean. This will involve obtaining a high-resolution chronology of the Middle/Upper Paleolithic interface in both continental and Adriatic Croatia and provide a more complete understanding of the relationships between Neandertals and early modern humans during the transitional period in Central Europe and the Mediterranean. Furthermore, comparison of Neandertal behaviour between two different paleoecological zones (Continental and Adriatic) will contribute a unique perspective on Neandertal adaptations. The project „Last Neandertals at the Crossroads of Central Europe and the Mediterranean – NECEM“ has been financed by Croatian Science Foundation, HRZZ-IP-2019-04-6649.

AdriaRom project aims to understand the Roman defence system on the eastern Adriatic coast conducted of two legionary fortresses (Burnum and Tilurium) and several forts between them. In scientific literature, this defence system was interpreted as a frontier and is sometimes referred to as the Delmataean limes. For successful implementation of reconstructing the defence system on the border zone, it is necessary to determine the positions of the assumed military sites and to formulate the structural indicators. In order to achieve this, airborne laser scanning (ALS) on the targeted areas was conducted in the spring of 2019, followed by the systematic field survey in the spring of 2020. Although the ALS data revealed a number of structures during the field survey there was no visible material on the surface. In the case of the archaeological site near Balina glavica we had a completely contrary situation to the one above. Due to intense agricultural activity, there were no identifiable features visible on the ALS data in the fields below the hill of Balina glavica. During the field survey, large deposits of pottery and tegulae were found on the drywalls and stone mounds created as a consequence of land clearance which points us to the presence of a large archaeological site dating back to Roman times. The common field surveying techniques of analyzing surface pottery finds did not show a result due to the fact that agricultural activities in the region have dropped significantly in recent years. For this reason, we were forced to come up with a field surveying method focusing on analyzing drywalls and clearance mounds, which could allow us to determine the approximate boundaries of the site. This paper will discuss our experience with field surveys based on ALS data where there is no identifiable material on the surface and the completely opposite situation where we have material but no other means to determine the nature or boundaries of the site.

The development in the fields of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) in the last decades opened up a great potential for increasing of the understanding of cultural/archaeological heritage. At the same time, many social and economic transformations also affected the sector of cultural heritage protection and management. HERISTEM is a strategic partnership project funded by the Erasmus+ Programme with the main goal of gathering high education institutions, institutions dealing with heritage preservation and protection, and small businesses in order to provide transfer of knowledge, skills, and good practices of STEM in the field of archaeology. The first activities of the Project: seminar for university teachers in online education and intensive course in remote sensing for students, both held at the University of Zagreb, have been successfully finished. However, the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic put the activities of the Project to a challenge, resulting in new ways of implementation of STEM, both in conducting Project activities and in the Project outcomes.