Preliminary study for the characterization of Roman plasters from the cetariae in Porto Palo (Sicily)

Genea Girimonte, Alessandra Pecci, Dario Bernal-Casasola, Daniele Malfitana, José J. Díaz, Antonio Mazzaglia, Paul Reynolds, Domenico Miriello

Abstract

This investigation concerns the characterization of plasters samples taken from archaeological vats from production installations for fish by-products from the archaeological site of Portopalo in Sicily (Italy). The main purpose of this work is to characterize the plasters in order to understand if specific plasters production technologies were used in relation to the function of the vats and if there is a change in time/space among the vats studied that apparently belonged to different phases of occupation of the site. The compositional characterization of the distinct types of materials used, necessary for the plasters production, required a multi-analytical approach [1-2-3-4], which included techniques such as optical microscopy with transmitted polarized light (OM); Xray diffractometry (XRD); scanning electron microscopy coupled with microanalysis (SEM-EDS); ion chromatography (CI). The first preliminary elaboration allows to suggest the presence of two distinct hydraulicizing materials used and a different content of salts in the different vats that could be related to a difference in the processing of fish or the duration of use.

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IMEKO-TC4-MetroArchaeo2022-001.pdf

DOI

10.21014/tc4-ARC-2022.001

IMEKO TC

TC4 - Measurement of Electrical Quantities

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