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Comparison of quantitative petrographic, stable isotope and cathodoluminescence data for fingerprinting Czech marbles

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An Erratum to this article was published on 21 August 2011

Abstract

Various marbles from both historic quarries and historical artefacts of the Czech Republic were examined in order to make determinations of their provenance. The methodology used was based upon a combination of petrographic image analysis (PIA) of thin sections, stable isotope geochemistry of carbonates, and cathodoluminescence. Multivariate statistical methods (i.e. cluster analysis and discriminant analysis) confirmed the geoscientific relevance of the marble’s different characteristics with a high degree of consistency as well as the enhanced significance of stable C and O isotopes in correlation with the petrographic data. The qualitative cathodoluminescence data provided a useful additional tool to help recognise the fingerprinting of marbles with similar petrographic and/or geochemical characteristics.

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Acknowledgments

Financial support for this study has been provided by a project of the Ministry of the Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic, Project No. MSM 0021620855, and by a postdoctoral project of the Grant Agency in the Czech Republic (GA CR) No. 205/09/P138. Special acknowledgement is given to F. Bůzek (Laboratory of stable isotopes, Czech Geological Society) for their cooperative attitude relating to the measurement of stable isotopes; V. Erban (Laboratory of radiogenic isotopes, Czech Geological Society) for help with the petrographic data visualisation (R program). The authors are also grateful to those conservationists from the National Heritage Institute who contributed artefact samples from selected historical monuments.

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  1. Institute of Geochemistry, Mineralogy and Mineral Resources, Charles University in Prague, Albertov 6, 128 43, Praha 2, Czech Republic

    Aneta Šťastná & Richard Přikryl

  2. Institute of Applied Mathematics and Information Technologies, Charles University in Prague, Albertov 6, 128 43, Praha 2, Czech Republic

    Alena Černíková

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  1. Aneta Šťastná
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  2. Richard Přikryl
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Correspondence to Aneta Šťastná.

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An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12665-011-1291-6

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Šťastná, A., Přikryl, R. & Černíková, A. Comparison of quantitative petrographic, stable isotope and cathodoluminescence data for fingerprinting Czech marbles. Environ Earth Sci 63, 1651–1663 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-010-0896-5

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