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Application of Compositional Analysis to the Study of Materials and Objects of Art and Archaeology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 February 2011

Edward V. Sayre
Edward V. Sayre*
Affiliation:
Conservation Analytical Laboratory, Museum Support Center, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. 20560
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Abstract

Archaeologists, art historians and art conservators are almost constantly concerned with the questions of where, when and by whom the objects within their care were made. Knowledge of the conditions under which the objects were found may not answer these questions, as the objects may have traveled extensively or have existed for some time before they arrived at sites where they were discovered. Stylistic considerations often can provide answers, but not infallibly, as styles were sometimes copied at locations and at times quite different from those for which they were most characteristic. Compositional analysis can often help provide answers to these questions because traditions in the use of particular materials have often persisted in and accordingly have been characteristic of particular regions, periods and even of particular workshops. For example, the deliberate alloying of copper with tin, arsenic, antimony, lead and/or zinc has varied greatly from region to region and from time to time.

Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 123: Symposium L – Materials Issues in Art and Archaeology I , 1988 , 41
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 1988

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