EstIronElectronicSupplements.zip

The aim of this study is to answer some of the preliminary questions about the differences in chemical composition of iron smelting slag finds inEstonia. The chemical analyses of smelting slag will allow to establish a production regions reference dataset for further research. Our analysis also includes currency blooms, of which some have been dated to the Estonian Viking Age (800 – 1050) and the Late Iron Age (1050 – 1227). The blooms are examined about their relationships with possible production regions. Using a multi-method analytical approach (SEM-EDS, LA-ICP-MS) and a multivariate data analysis (PCA, AHC and a set of supervised methods) it is argued thatEstoniamost likely had a highly interconnected local exchange with iron between different regions. An existence of exchange centres which specialised in the production of such blooms is also possible. A key methodological finding is that, contrary to results reported in the literature covered in the introduction, there exists a considerable overlap between the discussed production regions. This indicates that even with a large number of samples, chemical elements and sophisticated statistical methods, a perfect separation of production areas may not always be achievable, especially when solely bog ores served as raw material for ironmaking. However, this study demonstrates that despite such a strong overlap of data in the chemical composition of the slags, a successful provenance study of artefacts is still possible.

本研究旨在解答有关爱沙尼亚境内出土炼铁炉渣化学成分差异的若干初步问题。对炼铁炉渣开展化学分析，可为后续研究构建生产区域参考数据集。本研究的分析对象还包括货币型锻铁块（currency blooms），其中部分可追溯至爱沙尼亚维京时代（800–1050年）与铁器时代晚期（1050–1227年）。本研究还探究了此类锻铁块与潜在生产区域之间的关联。本研究采用多方法分析手段（扫描电子显微镜能谱仪（SEM-EDS）、激光剥蚀电感耦合等离子体质谱仪（LA-ICP-MS））与多元数据分析方法（主成分分析（PCA）、系统聚类分析（AHC）及一系列监督学习方法），论证得出爱沙尼亚不同区域间大概率存在高度互联互通的铁器本地贸易网络。此外，存在专门生产此类锻铁块的贸易集散中心的可能性亦不能排除。一项重要的方法学发现为：与引言部分综述的文献结果相悖，本次讨论的各生产区域间存在显著的化学成分重叠。这表明，即便采用大量样本、多项化学元素指标与复杂的统计方法，也未必总能实现生产区域的完美区分，当炼铁原料仅为沼泽铁矿时尤为如此。但本研究仍证明，即便炉渣化学成分数据存在如此显著的重叠，人工制品的产地溯源研究仍可取得成功。