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Determining the Provenience of Garnet Beads Using LA-ICP-MS

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Recent Advances in Laser Ablation ICP-MS for Archaeology

Part of the book series: Natural Science in Archaeology ((ARCHAEOLOGY))

Abstract

Stone and glass beads have been found at Iron Age (500 bc–ad 500) sites across Southeast Asia and are often assumed to be indicators of contact with South Asia. However, recent research on glass, agate, and carnelian beads indicates there may have also been local production of these materials. In Cambodia, two different types of garnet beads have been identified at several Iron Age sites. The first type is spherical, well-polished, and appears to have been drilled with a diamond drill, a drilling technique that is strongly associated with Indian bead production. The second type of garnet bead is unpolished, unshaped, and drilled using a variety of different drilling methods. Based on these initial differences, it was hypothesized that there were two different bead-making traditions represented amongst the garnet beads, and that the second type of garnet bead may have been locally produced. To investigate this question more thoroughly the garnet beads were analyzed using laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) in order to determine their chemical composition. Geological source samples from a variety of garnet sources across South and Southeast Asia were also analyzed using LA-ICP-MS. Results indicate that LA-ICP-MS is an excellent tool for differentiating between garnet sources and analyzing archaeological garnet artifacts with minimal damage. Furthermore, the results of the study confirm that the two types of beads were made from distinctly different garnet sources, although the locations of these sources remain unknown.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the Cambodian government and the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts for allowing me to work on and analyze the archaeological materials. Heng Sophady, Vuthy Voeun, Seng Sonetra, and Vin Laychour from the Memot Centre for Archaeology kindly provided materials from Village 10.8 and Bit Meas. Dr. Andreas Reinecke assisted with materials and information from Prohear. I am grateful to Dr. Miriam Stark for providing materials from Angkor Borei and ongoing advice on this project. Sokha Tep provided helpful advice on beads from Bit Meas. Drs. Rajan and Chaisuwan provided materials from Porunthal and Phu Khao Thong respectively. David Bernstein assisted with samples from Vietnam and Katie Lindstrom kindly provided samples Sri Lanka. I am grateful for the ongoing help of Laure Dussubieux at the LA-ICP-MS lab at the Field Museum. Thanks to Mark Golitko and two anonymous reviewers for their comments on a draft of this chapter, as well as my colleagues at UW-Madison, including Drs. James Burton, J. Mark Kenoyer, Gwen Kelly, Marc Kissel, and Gregg Jamison.

Table 5 Compositional results for garnet artifacts and geologic sources. Major and minor elements reported as percent oxide and trace elements as parts per million
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  1. Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, 109 Davenport Hall, Urbana, IL, 61801, USA

    Alison K. Carter

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  1. Alison K. Carter
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Correspondence to Alison K. Carter .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Integrative Research Center, Elemental Analysis Facility, Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Illinois, USA

    Laure Dussubieux

  2. Department of Anthropology, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana, USA

    Mark Golitko

  3. Institut de Recherche sur les Archéomatériaux Centre Ernest Babelon, CNRS/Université d’Orléans, Orléans, France

    Bernard Gratuze

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Carter, A.K. (2016). Determining the Provenience of Garnet Beads Using LA-ICP-MS. In: Dussubieux, L., Golitko, M., Gratuze, B. (eds) Recent Advances in Laser Ablation ICP-MS for Archaeology. Natural Science in Archaeology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49894-1_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49894-1_16

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