First evidence for alloying practices in the Chalcolithic Southern Levant (4500–3800 BCE) as revealed by metallography

Heritage Science

Table 2 SEM–EDS pseudo-bulk analyses in wt.% for the metal sections

Section	Object	Magnification	Metallographic group	Cu	Sb	Pb	Bi	As	Ni	Ag	SiO₂	Cl	Al₂O₃
F203-m1	Standard (fragment)	1000	High polymet	65.68	17.74	3.49		7.74		1.19	4.15
F204-m	Mace head (fragment)	150	Low polymet	90.54	5.63	0.11					0.25		3.47
F205-m	Crown (fragment)	500	Low polymet	95.41	1.69	1.56		1.34
F206-m	Axe (fragment)	700	Low polymet	90.98	6.44	0.62		1.58				0.38
F208-m	Mace head (fragment)	1000	Low polymet	100.00
F217-m	Standard (fragment)	1000	Unalloyed copper	98.58							1.42
F220-c	Mace head (fragment)	1000	Low polymet	97.32	1.27	1.20						0.22
F220-m	Mace head (fragment)	1200	Low polymet	92.51							7.49
F220-m	Mace head (fragment)	1200	Low polymet	93.20							6.80
F231-m	Crown (fragment)	250	F231	98.62	1.38
F234-m	Axe (fragment)	1300	Unalloyed copper	99.35	0.65
F238-m1	Crown (fragment)	200	High polymet	65.11	19.83	10.65	0.17	4.25
F238-m2	Crown (fragment)	1000	High polymet	45.50	18.74	24.70		5.54			1.56	3.95
F4-107-m	Axe	200	Unalloyed copper	75.58							24.42
F4-107-m	Axe	200	Unalloyed copper	76.28							23.72
F502-m	Axe (fragment)	1500	F502	69.94				0.96	1.68		27.42
F502-m	Axe (fragment)	1500	F502	69.21				1.04	1.36		28.39
F703-m	Fragment	1500	Unalloyed copper	86.98							13.02

“polymet. low” and “polymet. high” denote polymetallic copper alloys with low and high levels of alloying elements, respectively. Due to the high porosity of section F204-m, alumina polishing powder could not be completely removed, resulting in the Al₂O₃ signal of this sample. No pseudo-bulk analysis could be obtained for sample F236 because of high porosity