Characterising British Early Bronze Age metalworking techniques using ToF ND and NRCA

Early Bronze Age metalworking techniques such as casting methods, hammering, and annealing can reveal insightful information regarding the decisions made by ancient metalworkers, which in turn can inform us about craft traditions and decision making. The standard method of analysis, metallography, is unfortunately destructive and it is difficult to obtain new microstructural information from samples for reasons of conservation. We propose the use of non-invasive ToF ND and NRCA characterisation to gain information on the casting and post-casting metalworking techniques employed on an axe and two daggers from the Great North Museum, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The compositional and microstructural data obtained from this experiment will act as a baseline for future experimental work on EBA British metalwork, and will be compared with legacy data from earlier metallographic sampling of Early Bronze Age implements.