abstract
The thick Pliocene clay beds located along the mouth of the Guadalhorce River in Malaga were used in the Roman era for amphorae production related to the ever-growing production of garum and salted fish. As a first step in their archaeometric characterization, a series of firing tests on the potential raw material have been carried out. The main aim of this work is to obtain a suitable tool for estimating the firing temperatures of those amphorae, as well as to make a comprehensive evaluation of the potential of an innovative external-standard method for measuring the amorphous content of a pottery sample, the G-factor method. The obtained results emphasize a highly amorphous content, over 50 wt% in some samples, which varies with the firing temperature. This shows the potential of this technique, which allows straightforward fully quantitative mineralogical analysis and a mineralogical comparison even between samples fired at very different temperatures.
keywords
EXTERNAL STANDARD METHOD; AMORPHOUS CONTENT; RAW-MATERIALS; POTTERY; CLAY; QUANTIFICATION; TEMPERATURE; STONEWARE; PORCELAIN; HYDRATION
subject category
Archaeology; Chemistry; Geology
authors
Compana, JM; Cabeza, A; Macias, J; Aranda, MAG; Leon-Reina, L
our authors
Javier Macias Montiel
PhD StudentGroups
acknowledgements
We thank Dr Terry Moxon, Auckley, Doncaster, UK, for providing the agate used as external standard, Dr Jaume Coll Conesa, Museo Nacional de Ceramica y Artes Suntuarias 'Gonzalez Marti', Valencia, Spain, for his advice in designing the firing process, and Mr Alvaro Torrejon for his help in making the clay briquettes. Financial support from FQM-113 (Junta de Andalucia) research grants is acknowledged. JMC also thanks MICINN for his FPU studentship.