THE ORIGIN OF BLACK‐FIGURE GREEK CERAMICS FOUND IN NAUCRATIS (NILE DELTA)*

At the site of the Greek trading port of Naucratis, located on the Canopic mouth of the Nile inland from Alexandria, Flinders Petrie and later archaeologists encountered sherds of Classical Greek black‐figure pottery. We have characterized the pastes of 14 of these specimens, drawn from the collections of the British Museum and the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, by neutron activation analysis and numerical taxonomy. The ceramics agree in composition with a reference group centred on Athens. We also investigated a small number of additional black‐figure sherds from other sites. One specimen, from Ruvo di Puglia (Italy), actually originated in or near Marseilles. There was no evidence for local manufacture of black‐figure pottery at Naucratis.     

NEUTRON ACTIVATION ANALYSIS AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM,LONDON

Neutron activation analysis was used at the British Museum from 1978 until 2002 for provenance studies on ceramics and marble. Significant numbers of the items analysed were of high quality and value, and careful sampling was necessary to avoid damage to the object. An in‐house British Museum Standard Pottery was established and inter‐calibrated with a number of standards used by other archaeometry laboratories. The results of the projects have been published in many papers, and the databases established will be of use to future scholars interested in the ceramic groups represented. Projects on Greek and Near Eastern pottery have been undertaken. Relatively large numbers of north European medieval and post‐medieval pottery samples were analysed, as well as the tin‐glazed ceramics of Spain and Italy. Classical marble has also formed the subject of another project and a database of quarry material has been established.     

A SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF N. MIDLANDS MEDIEVAL TILE PRODUCTION

Summary. This paper describes a study of neutron activation analyses of some medieval tiles from the North Midlands. Having established the feasibility of the method of analysis, we applied a number of multivariate statistical techniques to derive eleven reference groups, each consisting of tiles with similar compositions which could plausibly have originated from the same source of clay. While known kiln sites could be readily distinguished, less confidence could be placed on the results where it was suspected that several sources had been mixed. Design information on the tiles when combined with the analytical results has led to the conclusion that stamps may have been passed from one tilery to another, though in some cases the tiles themselves were moved. The reference groups have proved to be useful in our continuing research on the composition of tiles from this area.     

SOLDERING ROMAN SILVER PLATE

Summary. Nineteen Roman silver objects, mainly from the British Museum's collection, with traces of solder, were examined by microscopy and analysed by x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy. The results are discussed in relation to work on soldered objects from earlier periods and to the contemporary literary sources which are reviewed, and the solder recipes listed. Pliny's recipes for stagnum, a solder for silver, and the evidence of soldering techniques provided by later texts are discussed in detail.
Silver-tin solders and a silver-mercury solder have been identified for the first time, and predate their first appearance in the literature. Experiments were made with tin and silver-tin solders and the results are discussed.