Sigrid Schmitt-Strecker

Early Bronze Age metallurgy: a newly discovered copper manufactory in southern Jordan

Recent excavations in southern Jordan have revealed the largest Early Bronze Age (c. 3600-2000 BC) metal manufactory in the ancient Near East. On-site Geographic Information Systems (GIS) analyses of the finds provide new evidence concerning the scale and organization of metal production at a time when the first cities emerged in this part of the Near East. Materials and lead isotope analyses of the metallurgical finds provide important data for reconstructing ancient metal processing and for identifying trade networks.

Über das frühe Kupfer Mesopotamiens

A lead isotope study »On the Early copper of Mesopotamia« reports on copper-base artefacts ranging in age from the 4 th millennium BC (Uruk period) to the Akkadian at the end of the 3 rd millennium BC. Arguments are presented that, in the (tin)bronzes, the lead associated with the tin used for alloying did not contribute to the total in any detectable way. Hence, the lead isotopy traces the copper and cannot address the problem of the provenance of tin. The data suggest as possible source region of the copper a variety of ore occurrences in Anatolia, Iran, Oman, Palestine and, rather unexpectedly (by us), from India. During the earliest period the isotopic signature of ores from Central and North Anatolia is dominant; during the next millennium this region loses its importance and is hardly present any more at all. Instead, southeast Anatolia, central Iran, Oman, Feinan-Timna in the rift valley between Dead Sea and Red Sea, and sources in the Caucasus are now potential suppliers of the copper. Generally, an unambiguous assignment of an artefact to any of the ores is not possible because the isotopic fingerprints of ore occurrences are not unique. In our suite of samples bronze objects become important during ED III (middle of the 3 rd millennium BC) but they never make up more than 50% of the total. They are distinguished in their lead isotopy by very high 206 Pb-normalized abundance ratios. As source of such copper we suggest Gujarat/ Southern Rajasthan which, on general grounds, has been proposed before to have been the most important supplier of copper in Ancient India. We propose this Indian copper to have been arsenic-poor and to be the urudu-luh-ha variety which is one of the two sorts of purified copper mentioned in contemporaneous written texts from Mesopotamia to have been in circulation there concurrently.

Copper objects from Arad - Their composition and provenance

We report lead isotope data and trace element contents for 21 copper artifacts from EB I/II layers at Arad and for 3 contemporaneous copper objects from the southern Sinai. All objects are made of pure, unalloyed copper; tin contents are invariably far below 1 percent, and arsenic in two cases reaches up to about 1 percent. We argue that even the latter is not due to intentional addition of arsenic to improve the qualities of the implements as such but is rather an incidental constituent. Also reported are results for copper ores from six deposits in the southern Sinai. Their lead isotope abundance ratios are distinctly different from those in the artifacts; a derivation of the artifacts from ores like these can definitely be excluded. There is excellent agreement, on the other hand, in the lead isotope fingerprint and the trace element abundances, between the artifacts and copper metal from Feinan and Timna. All present evidence points to these source areas as having supplied a considerable fraction of the metal retrieved at EB I/II Arad, with circumstantial evidence favoring Feinan over Timna. The results challenge previously held assumptions that Arad was a major trading center for copper from Sinai.

On Early Bronze Age Copper Bar Ingots from the Southern Levant

We report on late Early Bronze Age (crescent-shaped) copper bar ingots from Khirbat Hamra Ifdan, Faynan, Jordan, from Har Yeruham in the central Negev, and from a stray find hoard from the Hebron Hills. All these ingots are composed of pure copper, with remarkably constant phase content and texture as well as concentrations of trace elements and lead isotope abundance ratios. We suggest the origin of these ingots to be the copper district of Faynan, Jordan. There are two reasons for the almost identical composition of the ingots. First, the Dolomite-Limestone-Shale Unit (Burj) that was mined during this time period in Faynan is characterized by a homogeneously composed copper mineralization. Second, copper lumps and prills, as well as copper-rich slags delivered from various smelting sites in this area to the central copper workshop of Khirbat Hamra Ifdan, were commonly remelted and recycled. This resulted in a characteristic cluster-fingerprint of Early Bronze Age Faynan copper, which was also identified in numerous bar ingots found elsewhere in the southern Levant.

On the Composition and Provenance of Metal Finds from Beşiktepe (Troia)

Lead isotopy and trace element contents of most of the copper-based artifacts from Besiktepe dating to Troia I suggest that the copper derives from western Anatolian ore deposits. Gumuskoy, Serceorenkoy, and Balya, all sites with evidence for prehistoric mining activities going back to the late third millennium B.C., are most conspicuous in this respect. These ore occurrences also qualify as sources for many of the contemporaneous copper objects from Thermi on Lesbos and Poliochni on Lemnos analyzed previously. Exceptions among the Troia I Besiktepe objects are the two pieces of bronze found among the 22 fragments chemically analyzed, and one piece of unalloyed copper. Notably, none of the copper objects can be traced back to Ergani, neither to its copper ores nor to its native copper. Eleven artifacts recovered from graves at the Besik-Necropolis, dating to Troia VI, are all bronze. Their trace element abundance patterns are remarkably uniform; silver contents in the bronzes are much lower than in the unalloyed copper dating to Troia I indicating that these bronzes cannot have been manufactured by alloying tin with the kind of copper that is present in the unalloyed copper. Lead isotope data, not available at present, will have to decide whether the characteristics of these bronze pieces are again foreign to all copper ores from Anatolia and the Aegean just as has been observed to be the case for most bronze objects from Poliochni and Thermi.

Kupfer- und bronzezeitliche Metallartefakte vom Westbalkan: Zur Frage nach den Quellen ihres Kupfers

Abstract Auf dem Westbalkan dominiert unter kupfer- und bronzezeitlichen Artefakten aus Rein-Kupfer das ostserbische Erzvorkommen von Maydanpek als mögliche Quelle für das Metall; sechzehn der neunzehn analysierten Objekte können aufgrund der Bleiisotopie diesem Vorkommen zugeordnet werden. Eine ähnliche Dominanz dieser Lagerstätte wurde bereits früher für Artefakte aus Serbien und Westbulgarien gefunden. Bei den Objekten aus Fahlerz- Kupfer und den (Zinn)Bronzen ist diese isotopische Signatur nicht (0 von 23) oder nur selten (1 von 33) vertreten. Die Bronze dieser Objekte kann somit nicht durch Zusammenschmelzen von Zinn mit örtlichem Rein-Kupfer hergestellt worden sein. Ihr blei-isotopischer Fingerabdruck weist auf eine Vielzahl verschiedener Erzquellen hin, darunter das bronzezeitliche Aibunar in Bulgarien. Für vier der Bronzen finden wir im gesamten Mittelmeerraum isotopisch passende Erze (bisher) nur in Feinan und Timna und dem Südwesten Sardiniens. Dans l’ouest des Balkans, le cuivre pur des artefacts du Chalcolithique et de l’âge du Bronze proviendrait essentiellement du gisement de Maydanpek en Serbie orientale. L’isotopie du plomb de seize des dix-neuf objets analysés permet de les attribuer à Maydanpek. On avait déjà observé une prédominance semblable de ce gisement parmi des objets de Serbie et de Bulgarie occidentale. Les objets en minerai de cuivre gris et en bronze ne présentent jamais (0 sur 23) ou que rarement (1 sur 33) cette signature isotopique. En clair, le bronze de ces objets ne peut pas avoir été produit en ajoutant de l’étain au cuivre local. L’isotopie du plomb suggère une grande variété de mines, dont Aibunar en Bulgarie qui date de l’âge du Bronze. Quatre des bronzes ne trouvent des équivalents isotopiques méditerranéens qu’à Feinan et Timna et dans le sud-ouest de la Sardaigne. Copper and Bronze Age artefacts from the Western Balkans, made of low-trace-element copper, agree in their lead isotopy with ores from Majdanpek in Eastern Serbia, suggesting this deposit to have been the prime source of this copper. A similar dominance of Majdanpek has been observed before among objects from Serbia and Western Bulgaria. Bronze objects and such made from fahlore copper show this isotope signature only rarely (1 out of 33 and 0 out of 23, respectively). Clearly, the bronze of these Western Balkan bronze objects cannot have been produced by adding tin to local copper. The lead isotopy suggests a variety of copper sources, among them prehistoric Aibunar in Central Bulgaria. Four of the bronzes with extreme isotope abundance ratios have fitting ores (as yet) only in Feinan and Timna, and in Southwest Sardinia.