Matthew Ponting

University of Liverpool | UoL · School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology

Our purpose is to better understand the actions and behaviours of people in the past, often with a focus on ancient economies, and we are willing to use tools from any discipline that allow us to explore these issues. This is why it is so important that the limitations of techniques applied to archaeology are presented as explicitly as their utilit...

Dated measurements of lead pollution in deep Greenland ice have become a useful proxy to monitor historical events because interruptions in lead-silver production result in fluctuations in lead emissions. However, the application of the lead emission record has not perhaps received the attention it deserves because of the difficulty in connecting m...

Although silver coins have been investigated through the lens of geological provenance to locate argentiferous ore deposits exploited in their production, we consider that this avenue of research may be a cul-de-sac, especially for studies that rely heavily on deciphering lead and silver isotope signatures that may have been altered by the addition...

The role that tin from Britain played in the European Bronze Age remains an unanswered question despite nearly two centuries of research. Were the exceptionally rich tin deposits in Cornwall and Devon the main tin source underpinning the massive technological and cultural transition from copper to full tin bronze (bronzization) across Europe and th...

Chapter 12 addresses the fact that, in c. AD 64, and again in AD 194, the silver content of the denarius was reduced significantly. This chapter explores some of the metallurgical and hoard evidence, looking at evidence for public reaction to these changes. Both reforms represent something of a watershed in the composition of many hoards. Can publi...

This interdisciplinary volume presents an introduction and fourteen papers by Roman numismatists, historians, and archaeologists, discussing coin hoarding in the Roman Empire from c. 30 BC to AD 400. The book introduces the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire Project, which is creating a database of all known Roman coin hoards from Augustus to AD 400,...

https://nms.iro.bl.uk/concern/book_contributions/aa67abf3-42a5-47a8-a5a2-c3ce2d3c6fb2

One of the great advantages of non-ferrous metals over most other materials, with the exception of glass, is the fact that artefacts that are broken or otherwise no longer of use can be melted down and remade into something else. For Roman coinage, this characteristic would have been particularly useful, enabling frequent changes of both emperor an...

The jewellery from tomb 124 at Riqqa, consisting of one pectoral and one winged beetle in gold and cloisonné work, one gold shell pendant decorated with wires and granulation, and one hollow gold amulet in the form of god Min, was analysed by handheld X‐ray fluorescence and scanning electron microscopy with energy‐dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy. Thi...

This paper looks at the evidence for the extraction of silver from lead ores in Iron Age and Roman Britain. Analysis shows that many of the lead objects from the Somerset Lake Villages were made from Mendip lead, but their chemical composition suggests that they were not produced from lead that had been de‐silvered, but from smelted galena with var...

This article reappraises the Walbottle (Throckley) hoard of late third-century Roman coins. The complicated biography of the hoard since its discovery in 1879 is described, followed by a summary of the re-identified coins and a discussion of the dating of the hoard. The results of a ground-breaking metallurgical study of a sample of the Walbottle c...

The fineness of Roman imperial and provincial coinage has been regarded as an indicator of the broader fiscal health of the Roman Empire, with the apparent gradual decline of the silver content being treated as evidence for worsening deficits and the contraction of the supply of natural resources from which the coins were made. This book explores t...

The Wirral brooch is a distinctive and easily recognizable type of Romano-British brooch with a distribution primarily focused on rural sites around the Wirral peninsula in the north-west of England. The article provides a brief catalogue of the type, investigates whether it is a truly regional form, and establishes its relationship with other cont...

Introduction ANCIENT coin dies which have survived to the present day are rare and are consequently regarded as particularly important numismatic objects, yet little is known about the metal alloys used to produce them. 1 Ascertaining the chemical composition of these objects gives us the possibility to determine with a high degree of certainty whe...

This article provides the cross referencing of archaeo-metallurgical finds with late antique Jewish texts to provide glimpses of sophisticated Jewish metal recycling technologies. The cross-disciplinary approach offers information that each discipline on its own cannot provide. Archaeological analysis shows complex alloys that have hitherto been co...

Interest in the composition of ancient coins is not recent. Up to 1908, most analyses had consisted solely of the major elemental compositions; little attempt had been made to study the trace elements, or, indeed, the microstructures. It was not until 1912 that metallography was first used to suggest Roman minting procedures. Levels of fineness and...

This chapter discusses issues surrounding the estimation of the silver content of Roman imperial silver coins and presents some results of ongoing research. Silver content is an important tool for the study of Roman fiscal policy and so reliable data are crucial. However, it is now clear that earlier published analyses using instrumental techniques...

Analyses of 71 Roman provincial silver coins of the Julio-Claudian emperors (27 BC-AD 68) minted at Caesarea in Cappadocia and Antioch and Tyre in Syria are discussed in this paper. The finenesses of the alloys are presented and it is proposed that there was a logical relationship between the standards used for Caesarea and Antioch. Trace element p...

hist-met.org/metalsframework1.pdf The volume provides a research framework for archaeometallurgy in Britain, including a resource assessment, a research agenda and an outline research strategy. The first section identifies the nature of the resource. The evidence ranges in scale from landscapes and townscapes to sites and structures; it includes a...

A selection of Roman military fittings and associated copper-alloy artefacts was analysed by inductively coupled plasma-atomic emission spectroscopy. The method used was a variant on those previously published and gives very good precision and accuracy. The Roman metalwork analysed conforms extremely well to similar artefacts analysed from, contemp...

This research explores temporal patterns in the procurement of raw materials for ceramic production, based mainly on material recovered in regional survey. The underlying premise is that potters in different cultural phases will preferentially exploit the same geological landscape for the most suitable raw materials, but different materials may be...

The results of the chemical analysis of 78 silver denarii issued by the Julio-Claudian emperors are presented and interpreted against the available numismatic, archaeological and historical information. Earlier surface analyses are found to be incorrect, especially for the coinage of Nero, and the reasons for this are investigated. The new elementa...

Images from scanning electron microscopy are now quite common and they can be of great value in archaeology. Techniques such as secondary electron imaging, backscattered electron imaging and energy-dispersive x-ray analysis can reveal information such as the presence of weevils in grain in Roman Britain, the composition of Roman coins and the b...

In this paper we present data to demonstrate the applicability of laser-ablation MC–ICP–MS isotope analysis to archaeological artefacts, in this case Roman silver coins. The technique requires no chemical preparation, does minimal damage to the sample and yields external reproducibility that is better than conventional TIMS analysis; 207Pb/206Pb =±...

The published analyses of Roman military copper-alloy metalwork from Masada are complimented by additional ICP-AES analyses of material from Gamla enabling further discussion of alloying trends and presenting new insights into the organization of the Roman military and the cultural specificity of brass technology.

Nineteen glasses from Maroni Petrera, Cyprus, dating to the sixth–seventh centuries ad, have been analysed by energy-dispersive X-ray analysis in the scanning electron microscope for major and minor elements. A subset of 15 glasses was also analysed for trace elements, using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. Two groups are identified. T...

Chemical analysis by ICP at the Fitch Laboratory (British School at Athens) is used to see if the imported LB II pottery at Phylakopi on Melos is Minoan or Mycenaean. The possibility of a Minoan thalassocracy and of Minoan colonies in the Cyclades is reconsidered in the light of this new evidence, trade routes to the Cyclades are examined, the natu...

This paper presents the results of the chemical analyses by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES) of a selection of vases from the recent excavations of Mycenaean tombs at Pylona, Rhodes. The data are used to support and confirm the stylistic attributions of the vases as either local Rhodian products or mainland imports....

A group of commonly represented copper alloy artefact types from the site of Bet She'an (Scythopolis), in Israel, were analysed by atomic absorption spectrometry. The aim was to study the compositional patterns of similar artefacts from the Late Roman through to the Mamluk periods (3rd to 14th centuries ad ). Fifty artefacts were analysed from five...

During the first three centuries AD several eastern provinces of the Roman empire produced silver coinages of specifically local denominations and types. It has been claimed that at certain periods the mint of Rome was employed to strike some of these coinages, rather than the provincial mints to which the coins are traditionally attributed. This c...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of London, 1994.

Towards the end of summer 1990, during the course of roadworks at Galley Lane, Fenny Stratford (Roman Magiovinium), just south of Milton Keynes, a local metal 'detectorist' discovered what appeared to be the 'raw materials' for the production of unofficial Roman coins. The find comprised three ceramic vessels containing three groups of material and...

By means of inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES), metallurgical analyses of southern Palestinian coins of the Persian period were performed. The main group of analyzed coins consists of dome-shaped quarter sheqels ("drachms"), which were struck from worn, recut and repolished obverse dies that based on their circulation...