Nanterre, September 8th 2004
Dear Colleagues,
It is with great interest that I have followed the discussion on
"vitrified" charcoal on the archaeobotanical list during the last
weeks, especially as I find this type of deformation in some of my
material from the Middle East. For example, it appears rather
frequently in Leguminosae wood, notably Acacia, from eatern Arabia,
independently of the chronological period.
The need for experimentation concerning this phenomenon has been
underlined by several colleagues and in fact quite some work has
already been done on this subject in a Ph.D. thesis that was defended
at the Sorbonne University in 1998.
The title of this work is:
Théry -Parisot I. (1998) Economie du combustible et paléoécologie en
contexte glaciaire et périglaciaire, Paléolithique moyen et supérieur
du sud de la France (anthracologie, expérimentation, taphonomie). PhD
thesis, University of Paris I-Panthéon-Sorbonne
The results have moreover been published in a monography:
Théry-Parisot I. (2001) Economie des combustibles au Paléolithique.
Expérimentation, taphonomie, anthracologie. Dossier de Documentation
Archéologique n° 20. CNRS Editions
A whole chapter (Chapter II "Les déformations anatomiques des charbons
de bois : signatures des pratiques de la collecte", 33-79) treats
anatomical deformations that may appear in archaeological charcoal. It
also contains the results of a whole series of experimentations using
different types of wood (variable species, dry versus green wood)
carbonised under various conditions (variable teperatures and duration
of heating).
For those who might be interested the book is diffused by CNRS Editions
([log in to unmask], www.cnrseditions.fr).
Best regards,
Margareta Tengberg
***
UMR 7041 - Archéologie et Sciences de l'Antiquité
Maison de l'Archéologie et de l'Ethnologie René Ginouvès
21 allée de l'Université
F-92023 Nanterre cedex
Tél. +33(0)146692640
E-mail : [log in to unmask]
|