Arun Banerjee

Sourcing african ivory in chalcolithic Portugal

A recent review of all ivory from excavations in Chalcolithic and Beaker period Iberia shows a marked coastal distribution – which strongly suggests that the material is being brought in by sea. Using microscopy and spectroscopy, the authors were able to distinguish ivories from extinct Pleistocene elephants, Asian elephants and, mostly, from African elephants of the savannah type. This all speaks of a lively ocean trade in the first half of the third millennium BC, between the Iberian Peninsula and the north-west of Africa and perhaps deeper still into the continent.

Organic Elemental Composition in Fingernail Plates Varies between Sexes and Changes with Increasing Age in Healthy Humans

Background: Keratin, an α-helical fibrous protein, is the primary component of human nail plates. No data on age-related changes in healthy subjects are present. Objective: This study investigated whether keratin amount and composition, as indicated by organic elemental composition of fingernails, varies with aging and between sexes. Methods: Nail clippings from 225 healthy individuals (93 males, 132 females), aged 20–90 years, were analyzed for carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and sulfur (S) contents with an automatic elemental analyzer. C/N and N/S ratios were calculated. The C/N ratio is indicative of keratin composition, i.e. the ratio of α-amino acids and protein. The relationship of elemental composition with dietary intake was analyzed by standardized food record. Results: Females have in their nails more sulfur (p < 0.001) and less nitrogen (p = 0.001), and thereby, a lower N/S ratio than males, whereas their carbon content is not different. With aging, the carbon content increases (p < 0.01, both sexes) and the nitrogen content decreases (p = 0.05, females), both leading to an increased C/N ratio (p < 0.001). By contrast, the sulfur content and the N/S ratio do not change with aging (p > 0.05). The carbon content correlates positively with macronutrient intake in females. Nitrogen and sulfur contents are not related with dietary intake. Conclusions: Results suggest that the N/S ratio is indicative of sex differences and the C/N ratio of aging in healthy humans. The increasing carbon content with ongoing age could be explained by loss of inorganic material from the nails, followed by a subsequent increase of organic material. The increasing C/N ratio gives evidence that keratin composition changes towards a higher amount of α-amino acids with aging.

Ivory Craftsmanship, Trade and Social Significance in the Southern Iberian Copper Age: The Evidence from the PP4-Montelirio Sector of Valencina de la Concepción (Seville, Spain)

Because of its great potential to provide data on contacts and overseas trade, ivory has aroused a great deal of interest since the very start of research into Iberian late prehistory. Research recently undertaken by the German Archaeological Institute in Madrid in collaboration with a number of other institutions has provided valuable contributions to the study of ivory in the Iberian Copper Age and Early Bronze Age. One of the archaeological sites that is contributing the most data for analysing ivory from the Copper Age in southern Iberia is Valencina de la Concepcion (Seville), which is currently the focus of several debates on the development of social complexity. This article contributes to this line of research by providing new, unpublished evidence and by examining the significance of ivory craftsmanship in commercial, social, and ideological terms. It also assesses in greater detail the prominent part played by luxury ivory items as an expression of social status and power.

Ivory in the Chalcolithic enclosure of Perdigões (South Portugal): the social role of an exotic raw material

Abstract This article discusses the social role played by ivory and ivory articles in the Perdigões enclosures (South Portugal) during the Chalcolithic (third millennium bc), in the context of the emergence and development of social complexity on the Iberian Peninsula. Perdigões is a Portuguese prehistoric site with some of the highest concentrations of ivory objects known in Iberia and with the greatest variety. The contexts, almost exclusively funerary, are discussed along with the results of provenance studies. Comparing the different contexts and the categories of objects made of ivory makes it possible to distinguishing a variety of active social dimensions (such as individual status, group identity, ideological referents, social or political roles, ontological and cosmological perceptions) to these items which drew on the importance of exotic raw materials in the reformulation of social relations that was taking place specifically at this site and in Iberia in general.

Identification of Chinese fresh-water pearls using MN2+ activated cathodoluminescence

Fresh-water tissue graft-cultured pearls from China were investigated using hot cathode and cold cathode cathodoluminescence microscopes. Supplementary investigations were done using X-radiography, a Scanning Electron Microscope, an optical microscope, and an Atomic Force Microscope (AFM). The results were compared with those of natural fresh-water pearls from the Mississippi river.Thin sections of fresh-water natural pearls from the Mississippi river could be distinguished from those of fresh-water tissue graft cultured pearls from China using a hot cathode cathodoluminescence microscope according to the distribution of Mn2+ as follows: (1) Fresh-water tissue graft cultured pearls from China contain domains of calcite, emitting orange cathodoluminescence in the central region, which are almost absent in the natural fresh-water pearls from the Mississippi river. (2) The concentration of Mn2+ in natural fresh-water pearls from the Mississippi river is marked by regular green (λ=566 nm) zones of CL from the middle up to the periphery, whereas in case of the tissue graft fresh-water pearls from China the Mn2+ concentration decreases from the middle towards the periphery of the pearl as it is revealed by the gradually diminishing of CL towards the periphery. Whole specimen of the two types of pearls mentioned above can be distinguished from one anotherwithout destroying the samples using a cold cathode cathodoluminescence microscope as follows: The intensity of CL at 566 nm emitted from the surface of natural fresh-water pearls from the Mississippi river is higher than the intensity of CL emitted from the surface of fresh-water tissue graft cultured pearls from China, due to the fact that the surface layers of the former pearls contain more Mn2+ than those of the later.A further criterion of the Chinese tissue graft cultured pearl is the utmost smoothness of their surfaces. Moreover according to AFM observation the size of the aragonite crystals on the surface of the Chinese fresh-water tissue graft cultured pearls is much smaller than those of natural fresh-water pearls from the Mississippi river.

Durbi Takusheyi: a high-status burial site in the western Central bilād al-sūdān

Durbi Takusheyi is a burial site composed of at least eight mounds located between the modern towns of Katsina and Daura in northern Nigeria. Parts of the mounds were first excavated in 1907 by Herbert Richmond Palmer in cooperation with the Emir of Katsina and later again in 1992 in the course of a German research project under the lead of Dierk Lange, Bayreuth. After the 1992 excavation, the retained blocks were stored in the Jos Museum, Nigeria, for further analyses. In 2007 the Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum (RGZM) and the National Commission for Museums and Monuments in Nigeria (NCMM) started a project with the objective of completely restoring and analyzing the excavated artefacts. While the remains of the first excavation appear to be lost with only minimal information preserved, the three mounds excavated in 1992 each contained a single interment in the centre of the mound, all three with various burial goods produced from inorganic (metal, glass, stone, cowries) and organic material (cloth, wood, hides). Many artefacts are of regional provenance but some were also imported from distant regions of the Islamic world. Following the currently available radiocarbon measurements, one group of the burials would date to the earlier fourteenth century AD, and judging from typology and art history another burial dates to the later fifteenth/early sixteenth centuries. The site thus covers a crucial phase in history during which the Hausa city states emerged, indicating shifting contacts to the Mediterranean and to the Middle East.