DATING ANCIENT LIME MORTARS BY GEOCHEMICAL AND MINERALOGICAL ANALYSIS

This paper proposes a method of dating based on the study of the mineralogy and geochemistry of lime mortars. If the mortars used in constructing the various parts of a building are made from limestones of distinct geochemistry (minor elements) and mineralogy (clay content), such differences should be identifiable in their compositions. Furthermore, if some parts of the building can be reliably dated, the mortars used in their construction can be compared with mortars taken from parts of the building whose dates are unknown. Under certain conditions, a relationship can be established between the mortars, and a date may be proposed. An experimental procedure, based on identification of mortar phases, is proposed. The method was tested on two historical monuments, built in the eleventh to twelfth and nineteenth centuries respectively, which illustrate different dating problems.     

ESTIMATION OF THE AGE OF A PRE‐INDUSTRIAL IRON SITE IN KOREA*

A pre‐industrial iron‐smelting site in Korea, whose period of active use is placed on typological grounds between the eighth and 18th centuries ad , has been dated using accelerator mass spectrometry and thermoluminescence. The ages of two charcoal samples were 77 ± 25 and 81 ± 25 years bp , with the calibrated date for both ranging from ad 1700 to ad 1955, while a clay fragment dated to ad 1650 ± 50. The results from typology and radiocarbon seem insignificant due to the considerable uncertainties involved, but in combination with the thermoluminescence result they place the most probable date of the site at around ad 1700.