Reference chemical data on ancient iron mining and smelting activities in Ariège, Aude, Pyrénées-Orientales (Occitanie, France) and Andorra

This dataset consists in chemical data obtained by analysing materials related to ancient iron ore mining and smelting activities. The dataset is composed of 473 chemical analyses, among which 162 have been collected from previous research papers. The remaining 311 are new, and have been performed as part of two research programs, FERMAPYR (https://arscan.parisnanterre.fr/feder-fermapyr/) and FERAPO. It is mainly composed of global analyses by ICP-OES and ICP-MS. Fifty-four chemical descriptors are the amount of major, minor and trace elements. Two more descriptors are isotopic ratios of iron, collected through MC-ICP-MS. This dataset has been set up as a reference upon which studies about the circulation of iron products and the reconstruction of ancient iron smelting techniques may rely. All the analyses have been implemented into the CHIPS database. This allows a standard structuration of data related to ancient iron metallurgy as well as easy access. Metadata such as the features of the analytical setups used to collect data are handled by this database. This information has been used to calculate the associated relative measurement errors, as a quality indicator. Contextual data (spatial, administrative, chronological) is also provided.