A provenance study of Mycenaean pottery from Northern Israel

The occurrence of imported Mycenaean pottery in the Late Bronze Age southern Levant is one of the most conspicuous aspects of Eastern Mediterranean trade connections during this period. A group of 183 Mycenaean pottery vessels from 14 sites in northern Israel, from both coastal and inland settlement contexts were analyzed by Neutron Activation Analysis. The results indicate that the vast majority of these vessels have a similar profile and can be provenanced to the north-eastern Peloponnese or more specifically, to the Mycenae/Berbati workshop in the Argolid. Possible interpretations of these results are presented and discussed against the historical and cultural background of the Late Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean.     

Middle Holocene hunter-gatherers of Cis-Baikal, Siberia: An overview for the new century

The paper examines Middle Holocene hunter-gatherer adaptive strategies in the Baikal region of Siberia based on diverse data (radiocarbon, mortuary, geochemical, genetic, human osteological, and zooarchaeological) accumulated over the last 10–15 years. The new model emphasizes the cyclical nature of the long-term changes and recognizes similarities between the Early Neolithic and Late Neolithic–Early Bronze Age cultures. The overall impression seems to be that change in the region was rapid rather than gradual. A number of interesting correlations between various cultural and environmental variables have been identified. During the Early Neolithic and Late Neolithic–Bronze Age, the spatial distributions of mortuary sites, open landscape, and good fisheries are all correlated and both intervals are coeval with periods of environmental stability. For the Early Neolithic two additional sets of correlated variables have been identified: (1) the uneven distribution of fish resources, uneven distribution of the human population, and cultural heterogeneity; and (2) poorer overall community health, more extensive male travel and heavier workloads, and higher reliance on fishing. For the Late Neolithic–Early Bronze Age, the sets of correlated variables are somewhat different: (1) more even distribution of terrestrial game resources (herbivores), more even distribution of the human population, and cultural homogeneity; and (2) better overall community health, less travel and lighter workloads, more equitable distribution of labor between males and females, and higher reliance on game hunting. Viewed together, these patterns emphasize the much more dynamic pattern of hunter-gatherer cultural variability, temporally and spatially, compared to what was known before.     

殷周时期的“举族”及其相关问题

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南阳汉代铜舟科学分析

本文对一件南阳汉代铜舟进行科学分析,认为其在合金技术、锻造技术、热处理技术和机械加工技术等方面,反映了我国古代青铜技术的先进水平。     

Differential diagnosis and discussion of a large nasal neoplasm from a late Bronze Age Athenian male

An adult male from the late Bronze Age of Athens, Greece, was found to have a large neoplasm in the nasal cavity. The characteristics of the lesion suggest that it was an osteoma of the ethmoid. Secondary infections of the paranasal sinuses are present as a result of the tumour blocking the sinus drainage. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

对激光清除青铜器粉状锈技术的分析和探讨

用激光技术清除青铜器文物的粉状锈开辟了防治“青铜病”的一种新途径.本文阐述了粉状锈生成机理和激光清除粉状锈的基本理论,介绍用激光器处理粉状锈的一些实际情况.对把激光用于清除粉状锈,作者提出了从理论到实际应用中的一些看法,且认为该技术目前仍处于试验阶段。采用何种类型的激光器?如何控制激光参数?还需要做大量的试验和研究.进而指出,用非调 Q 脉冲式钕玻璃激光器进行清除工作,实际上对青铜器会带来严重损伤,对珍贵的青铜器文物不宜采用.     

世界铜鼓之王——北流型101号铜鼓铸造工艺研究

体大壁薄的世界铜鼓之三──北流型101号铜鼓是世界上迄今所见最大的一面铜鼓,具有相当大的铸造难度。本文对北流型101号铜鼓的内外陶范及鼓耳的制作方法、内范结构、在外范上直接制作纹饰的方式、浇注工艺和垫片的使用等古代铸造工艺进行了研究。还探讨了该铜鼓的结构特征及鼓足残缺的成因。     

青铜病的发生与小孔腐蚀的关系

青铜病的产生与青铜器铸件本身的缺陷所产生的小孔腐蚀有一定的关系,小孔腐蚀可以解释青铜病的腐蚀现象。根据小孔腐蚀的特征,采用激振除锈垢和化学溶液相结合的方法,可以提高对青铜病的处理效果。进一步深入对小孔腐蚀的研究是解决青铜病问题的方向。     

Morphometry of Middle Bronze Age palstaves by Discrete Cosine Transform

The Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) is a Fourier-related transform widely used in signal processing and well suited to the analysis of open outlines. This method was applied here to evaluate the discrimination power of the inner lateral rib for two palstave populations dating from the Middle Bronze Age, excavated in northwest France. A corpus of almost 400 palstaves (bronze axes) of the Breton and Norman types was processed, and compared to specimens found at Sermizelles in Burgundy. The procedure is robust and produces a discrimination in good agreement with the traditional typology. Besides the definition of a ‘standard’ shape for each population, the morphometrical approach allows shape disparity, which is generally inaccessible to the naked eye, to be visualised and quantified. Shape disparity indicates that, contrary to previous assumptions, the bronze axes from the Sermizelles hoards cannot be explained as an assortment of Breton and Norman palstaves alone. We believe that this approach is quick, reproducible, and generalisable enough to be applied to a wide variety of artefacts from different periods, in order to clarify their typology and even their origin.     

New light on old pumice: the origins of Mediterranean volcanic material from ancient Egypt

This paper presents and discusses the Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA) results newly obtained from pumice pieces found decades ago at the Egyptian sites of Maiyana, Sedment, Kahun, and Amarna – now in the collections of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, and the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London – which could be successfully related to several volcanic eruptions in the Mediterranean. The work contributes to the constant accumulation of knowledge concerning the first appearance of pumice from the so-called Minoan eruption of the Santorini volcano. In addition, it unexpectedly sheds more light on the long-distance trade of Mediterranean volcanic material in the Bronze Age world by disclosing another connection between Lipari and the Eastern Mediterranean.