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Materials in movement: gold and stone in process in the Upton Lovell G2a burial

Materials in movement: gold and stone in process in the Upton Lovell G2a burial
Materials in movement: gold and stone in process in the Upton Lovell G2a burial
Excavated over two centuries ago, the Upton Lovell G2a ‘Wessex Culture’ burial has held a prominent place in research on Bronze Age Britain. In particular, was it the grave of a ‘shaman’ or a metalworker? We take a new approach to the grave goods, employing microwear analysis and scanning electron microscopy to map a history of interactions between people and materials, identifying evidence for the presence of Bronze Age gold on five artefacts, four for the first time. Advancing a new materialist approach, we identify a goldworking toolkit, linking gold, stone and copper objects within a chaîne opératoire, concluding that modern categorisations of these materials miss much of their complexity.
0003-598X
Crellin, Rachel
cfc18b98-b312-4080-bfe4-e7da5d3fcf7f
Tsoraki, Christina
653e5e24-4c63-4001-9961-02b5ebc4b94f
Standish, Christopher
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Pearce, Richard
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Barton, Huw
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Morriss, Sarah
c4bba0ee-1e3f-456c-922b-ead37710793e
Harris, Oliver
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Crellin, Rachel
cfc18b98-b312-4080-bfe4-e7da5d3fcf7f
Tsoraki, Christina
653e5e24-4c63-4001-9961-02b5ebc4b94f
Standish, Christopher
0b996271-da5d-4c4f-9e05-a2ec90e8561d
Pearce, Richard
7d772b25-3ad0-4909-9a96-3a1a8111bc2f
Barton, Huw
7633b046-b01f-44c7-89ab-5ef11a152d5d
Morriss, Sarah
c4bba0ee-1e3f-456c-922b-ead37710793e
Harris, Oliver
7b0664fa-8522-4c97-b924-a7de6a52a56d

Crellin, Rachel, Tsoraki, Christina, Standish, Christopher, Pearce, Richard, Barton, Huw, Morriss, Sarah and Harris, Oliver (2022) Materials in movement: gold and stone in process in the Upton Lovell G2a burial. Antiquity. (doi:10.15184/aqy.2022.162).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Excavated over two centuries ago, the Upton Lovell G2a ‘Wessex Culture’ burial has held a prominent place in research on Bronze Age Britain. In particular, was it the grave of a ‘shaman’ or a metalworker? We take a new approach to the grave goods, employing microwear analysis and scanning electron microscopy to map a history of interactions between people and materials, identifying evidence for the presence of Bronze Age gold on five artefacts, four for the first time. Advancing a new materialist approach, we identify a goldworking toolkit, linking gold, stone and copper objects within a chaîne opératoire, concluding that modern categorisations of these materials miss much of their complexity.

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More information

Accepted/In Press date: 29 April 2022
e-pub ahead of print date: 16 December 2022

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 473576
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/473576
ISSN: 0003-598X
PURE UUID: ac35ed8e-bdca-447b-b893-d90f21fc30c3
ORCID for Christopher Standish: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-9726-295X

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Date deposited: 24 Jan 2023 17:32
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 03:35

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Contributors

Author: Rachel Crellin
Author: Christina Tsoraki
Author: Richard Pearce
Author: Huw Barton
Author: Sarah Morriss
Author: Oliver Harris

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