Welding a New Approach to the Study of Ancient Metals

Abstract

Two communities have emerged in archaeometallurgy: the archaeologists, largely educated in the humanities, and the material scientists. Killick (2015; Pearce, 2016) has illustrated the non-communication and mutual lack of interest in the debates between the two traditions, one focused on the social and symbolic aspects of metalwork, the other interested in techniques of analysis and chemical and mineralogical processes. This session aims to build bridges the two approaches, encouraging collaborative research goals, and thereby to fuse the two in a new understanding.