Multi-technique characterization of dyes in ancient Kaitag textiles from Caucasus

Kaitag textiles, named after the Kaitag district of Southwest Daghestan, Russia, where it is being manufactured, are a unique embroidered textile art form. They were used by families on special occasions such as the birth, marriage or death of one of their members and were thus passed down from generation to generation as family heirlooms. Today, only a few hundred of these precious antique specimens can still be found, and surviving examples are mostly from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In this article, an extensive work for the scientific analysis of Kaitag textiles is presented as the logical continuance and updating of the investigations performed by thin layer chromatography almost two decades ago. A multi-technique approach involving the combined use of micro-invasive and nondestructive techniques suitable for in situ analyses was used, aiming to identify the colourants of Kaitag textiles and the inks employed for the underlying drawing. Analyses were performed by high-performance liquid chromatography, surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy combined with energy dispersive X-ray analysis, as well as visible reflectance spectroscopy and X-ray fluorescence. In addition, infrared reflectography and ultraviolet fluorescence were employed to visualise underlying drawings and possible restorations. Corrosion phenomena observed in brown- and black-dyed areas were also investigated.     

Roman amber identified as Siegburgite

A small amber fragment from the period of Roman occupation of Numantia (Garray, Spain) was characterised by Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy and optical microscopy. The material was found to be a polystyrene-like material, which is a very rare fossil resin known as Siegburgite or class III amber. Until now, this material was found in Europe only at two sites, both localised in Germany, and it is the first time that this type of amber was identified in wrought archaeological artefacts. The discussion includes the applicability of the method to distinguish false from true and amber of different origins, its use and trading as well as a hypothesis for a transport route. The study highlights the need for a more systematic study of archaeological amber remains. The finding also proves the exploitation and trading of local, non-Baltic amber deposits throughout the Roman Empire.     

5,000 years old Egyptian iron beads made from hammered meteoritic iron

The earliest known iron artefacts are nine small beads securely dated to circa 3200 BC, from two burials in Gerzeh, northern Egypt. We show that these beads were made from meteoritic iron, and shaped by careful hammering the metal into thin sheets before rolling them into tubes. The study demonstrates the ability of neutron and X-ray methods to determine the nature of the material even after complete corrosion of the iron metal. The iron beads were strung into a necklace together with other exotic minerals such as lapis lazuli, gold and carnelian, revealing the status of meteoritic iron as a special material on a par with precious metal and gem stones. The results confirm that already in the fourth millennium BC metalworkers had mastered the smithing of meteoritic iron, an iron–nickel alloy much harder and more brittle than the more commonly worked copper. This is of wider significance as it demonstrates that metalworkers had already nearly two millennia of experience to hot-work meteoritic iron when iron smelting was introduced. This knowledge was essential for the development of iron smelting, which produced metal in a solid state process and hence depended on this ability in order to replace copper and bronze as the main utilitarian metals.     

Protocol for lapis lazuli provenance determination: evidence for an Afghan origin of the stones used for ancient carved artefacts kept at the Egyptian Museum of Florence (Italy)

Despite that the Badakhshan Province (Afghanistan) remains the most plausible hypothesis for the lapis lazuli used in antiquity, alternatives proposed in literature are worth to study to confirm or disprove their historical reliability. In this work, a protocol for determining the provenance of lapis lazuli rocks used for carved artefacts is described. Markers for the univocal attribution of the raw material to a source were identified analysing 45 rocks of known provenance (among which 15 georeferenced) from 4 quarry districts. To the best of our knowledge, this reference database is the widest in provenance studies on lapis lazuli. All the markers are recognisable by means of Ion Beam Analysis (IBA) techniques, in particular micro-proton-induced x-ray emission (PIXE) and micro-ionoluminescence (IL). These techniques are non-invasive and applicable in air, allowing to analyse artworks and rocks of practically any shape and dimension without sample preparation.The protocol was applied to determine the provenance of raw material used for carved lapis lazuli artefacts kept at the Egyptian Museum of Florence, the second most important Egyptian museum in Italy, second only to the museum of Turin. The collection in Florence has a great historical value and includes several lapis lazuli pendants, scarabs, small statuettes and amulets ascribable mainly to the first millennium BC. Following the protocol, 11 of these artefacts were analysed by means of IBA techniques. Results ascribe the raw material to the Afghan quarry district.     

A Late Roman ceramic production from Pompeii

The Via Lepanto site is one of the best examples showing how the Vesuvian region was partially reconstructed and earlier re-occupied after Vesuvius's eruption in the year 79 AD. The large amount of ceramic finds illustrates the typology in use in this area during the IV and V century AD. Analyses were focused on table and cooking ware productions. Archaeometric data were obtained using chemical and minero-petrographical methods (OM, XRD, XRF and SEM). Grain size measurements using Image Analyses on thin sections and a geochemical comparison with clayey deposits outcropping in the Campania region permitted the identification of the raw materials used for these pottery productions. XRD and SEM completed the data set, establishing the protocols used for pottery production in the Pompeii area during Late Roman period. The Via Lepanto site was part of an exchange network of markets with a periodic frequency, where locally produced and imported pottery was sold, indicating a flourishing network of exchanges spanning short, medium and long distances.     

Multi-technique investigation of historical Chinese dyestuffs used in Ningxia carpets

In this article, an extensive work is presented concerning the characterization with both chromatographic (high-performance liquid chromatography) and spectroscopic (surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy and visible reflectance spectroscopy) techniques of historical Chinese dyestuffs in several carpets, mostly coming from the Ningxia region in Northern China and dating to the seventeenth–nineteenth centuries. Notably, the color of the background of these fine artifacts has been an object of debate since, while being depicted as bright red in the ancient iconography, nowadays it appears as orange/yellow. Therefore, in addition to the identification of all the colorants used in the carpets, the present study investigated the reasons of this apparent inconsistency, pointing out an explanation based on the joined use of the yellow dye obtained from the pagoda tree and a “fugitive” dye obtained from brazilwood.     

Gaming the System: Tactical Workarounds and the Production of Antagonistic Subjectivities among Migrant Platform Workers in Italy

Our article explores how migrant food delivery couriers work around platform algorithmic control to argue that gaming the system is a form of everyday resistance. Drawing on data collected in Turin, Italy, between August 2020 and June 2021, we examine how, on the one hand, through gamification, food delivery platforms construct the couriers as entrepreneurial and productive subjects; on the other hand, we show that the disarticulation and repurposing of these management mechanisms both address survival needs and signal a still fledgling, but potentially vibrant, space of labour activism. By conceptualising gamification as another weapon in capital's arsenal to control labour, we acknowledge the entanglement of workers’ agency and subjectivity. We thus bring a two-fold contribution to radical geography: we link gamification to the “production of subjectivity”, drawing on the Italian Operaista intellectual tradition; and we posit the subversive and generative potential of migrant couriers’ everyday geographies.     

Social Boundaries and Networks in the Diffusion of Innovations: a Short Introduction

This short introduction briefly recalls how sociological theories and formal methods for social networks can help to interpret diffusion processes of ancient cultural traits. It also provides a presentation of the selected papers. These papers focus not on the ways archaeological data can be represented in a relational format, but on the potential of specific sociological network-related models to gain insights into the underlying mechanisms of diffusion processes. The necessity to develop more fine-grained information to reconstruct ancient local social networks is underlined while three aspects of the diffusion process are explored: (a) situations in which cultural practices are not borrowed in spite of contact between groups; (b) situations in which cultural practices are adopted; and (c) situations in which cultural practices in one group are copied by people from another group. All of them take inspiration from sociological studies of diffusion processes through networks, although to different extents.     

Extreme right parties in Western Europe: the case of the Italian Northern League

Abstract

This article argues that voters of the Italian Lega Nord have been radicalized in recent years, shifting from an intermediate ‘centrist’ position to the extreme right. Data from both national and European mass surveys (e.g. Italian National Election Studies and European Electoral Studies) provide additional support for this shift from left to right and the accompanying changes in criteria (i.e. immigration, democracy, civil rights, European integration, and politics), indicating that Lega Nord voters have evolved into a body that fits the new extreme-right concept well.