Thomas Stöllner

The Economy of Dürrnberg-Bei-Hallein: An Iron Age Salt-mining Centre in the Austrian Alps

For the first time in English, we present a summary of the international programme of excavation work carried out between 1990 and 2001 in and around the Iron Age salt-mining complex of the Diirrnberg region, south of Salzburg. First we describe the results of excavation in the prehistoric adits, and of work to locate and survey associated settlements. This is followed by a series of specialist reports embracing floral and faunal remains, palaeodiet and parasitology, leather and woodworking and other crafts. The evidence suggests that a complex inter-relationship existed between the Diirrnberg and other communities in the Alpine foreland. It is assumed that the Diirrnberg was under the control of an elite – perhaps a local dynasty whose wealth is reflected in the graves.

Fasciola hepatica eggs in paleofaeces of the Persian onager Equus hemionus onager, a donkey from Chehrabad archaeological site, dating back to the Sassanid Empire (224–651 AD), in ancient Iran

Fascioliasis is a highly pathogenic zoonotic disease caused by the liver trematodes Fasciola hepatica and F. gigantica. Within the multidisciplinary initiative against this disease, there is the aim of understanding how this disease reached a worldwide distribution, with important veterinary and medical repercussions, by elucidating the spreading steps followed by the two fasciolids from their paleobiogeograhical origins. Fasciola eggs were detected in paleofaeces of a donkey, probably the present-day endangered Persian onager Equus hemionus onager, found in the Chehrabad salt mine archaeological site, Zanjan province, northwestern Iran. The biological remains dated back to the Sassanid period, 224-651 AD. Egg characteristics allowed for their specific ascription to F. hepatica. The interest of this finding relies on the fact of being the first archaeological finding of Fasciola in Asia and the Near East. Moreover, it allows to reach many conclusions about historical, epidemiological and spreading aspects of the disease. The finding in Chehrabad indicates that, at that time, this fasciolid had already spread through the Zagros mountains eastward from the Fertile Crescent. In that region and in ancient Egypt, livestock domestication played a crucial role in facilitating the disease spread during the postdomestication period. Donkeys appear at present to be usually infected by fasciolids in countries of the Fertile Crescent - Ancient Egypt region or neighbouring that region, with prevalences from low to very high. The high pathogenicity and mortality induced by Fasciola in these equines should be considered as an additional potential factor among the causes of the extinctions of E. h. hemippus in Syria, E. h. hydruntinus in the Anatolia-Balkans area, E. h. onager in the Caucasus and maybe also its decline in Iran. Indeed, Eurasiatic wild asses were present in the region and neighbourhood of the Fertile Crescent when the domestication of the livestock reservoirs of Fasciola began.

Erratum to: Radiological findings in an ancient Iranian salt mummy (Chehrābād ca. 410–350 BC)

“Radiological findings in an ancient Iranian salt mummy” published in Skeletal Radiology June 2015 Vol 44 Issue 6 p 811–821 included a significant amount of material that had previously been published in Metalla, the Journal of the German Mining Museum, Nr.21/2014, 103–112. We take duplicate publication very seriously. This duplication was brought to our attention by one of the authors and we are convinced that it was an honest error. Since Metalla is not widely indexed, and since there is no overlap of the readership, we have obtained agreement from the editor of Metalla to permit publication of this erratum rather than retracting the article.

Methods of Mining Archaeology (Montanarchäologie)

Ancient mining practices are often overlooked in favour of the smelting and working practices that led to metal objects. However, mining was, in many ways, the most socially and economically taxing part of the chaine operatoire of ancient metallurgy, involving groups of people in both intra- and inter-regional trade relationships. Montanarchaologie or “mining archaeology” is the formal study of ancient mining and ore extraction processes, and includes the study of mining techniques, social organisation and economic networks that made ore extraction possible.