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Luminescence and compositional studies for the identification of “fire-setting” features at prehistoric mine La Turquesa (Catalonia, Spain)

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Abstract

Modern mining activities often leads to destruction of archaeological records, making difficult to date the contexts and tools. In this work, a prehistoric mine with “fire-setting” techniques evidence was used to demonstrate the relevance of luminescence protocols to identify and date ancient mining activities. Chemical and mineralogical studies complemented the dosimetric ones by means of luminescence protocols. One of the samples shows lower absorbed dose suggesting heating procedures, like “fire-setting” and its luminescence age, determined by SAROSL, points to copper exploitation during the Middle/Late Bronze Age at La Turquesa mine, in accordance with archaeological records.

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Acknowledgements

Portuguese team gratefully acknowledge the FCT (Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation) support through the UID/Multi/04349/2013 and UID/Multi/04349/20 (including a post-doctoral grant BL 36/2016_IST-ID of the first author in the C2TN) and post-doctoral grant SFRH/BPD/114986/2016 of the first author. Archaeometric and archaeological research has been possible thanks to various projects financed by the Autonomous Government of Catalonia and the Government of Spain: The protohistoric archaeological site of El Calvari del Molar and the mining-metallurgical area of Molar-Bellmunt-Falset (2000-2012) and Mining and Metallurgy in southern Catalonia: from Prehistory to the Mediaeval Period, 2014-2017 (Department of Culture, Government of Catalonia); The mining-metallurgical area of Molar-Bellmunt-Falset in Protohistory (Ministry of Science and Innovation, HUM2004-04861-C03-01); The mining-metallurgical area of Molar-Bellmunt-Falset in Protohistory: a comparison of hypotheses (Ministry of Science and Innovation, HAR2007-65725-C03-01); Social, technological and economic processes in the exploitation of mineral resources in the Priorat (Catalonia): a diachronic view (Ministry of Science and Innovation, HAR2010-21105-C02-01) and Mineral-metallic resources, trade and commerce in the prehistory and protohistory of the Iberian Peninsula (Catalonia and the north of the Valencian Country) (Ministry of the Economy and Competitiveness, HAR2014-54012-P). The study of the structure and mineralogy of the mine was carried out within the framework of the Consolidated Group of Mineral Resources 2014SGR 1661 of the Government of Catalonia. The archaeometry of minerals and metals was made possible by the technical and human support provided by the SGIker of the University of the Basque Country (EHU) and European funding (ERDF and ESF).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Ciências e Tecnologias Nucleares (C2TN), Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, E.N. 10 (km 139,7), 2695-066, Bobadela, Portugal

    Ana Luísa Rodrigues, Rosa Marques, Maria Isabel Dias, Maria Isabel Prudêncio & Dulce Russo

  2. Departamento de Engenharia e Ciências Nucleares (DECN), Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, E.N. 10 (km 139,7), 2695-066, Bobadela, Portugal

    Rosa Marques, Maria Isabel Dias, Maria Isabel Prudêncio & Dulce Russo

  3. Divisão de Planeamento e Proteção Radiológica, Departamento de Emergência e Proteção Radiológica, Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente, Bobadela, Portugal

    Guilherme Cardoso

  4. Facultat de Geografia i Història, Universitat de Lleida, plaça Víctor Siurana 1, 25003, Lleida, Spain

    Núria Rafel Fontanals

  5. Departament de Prehistòria, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Edifici B, 08197, Bellaterra, Spain

    Eni Soriano

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  1. Ana Luísa Rodrigues
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Rodrigues, A.L., Marques, R., Dias, M.I. et al. Luminescence and compositional studies for the identification of “fire-setting” features at prehistoric mine La Turquesa (Catalonia, Spain). J Radioanal Nucl Chem 331, 1397–1408 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-022-08198-0

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