The VG-38-54-30 Double Focussing Multicollector Mass Spectrometer in the Isotrace Laboratory and an oxhide ingot from the Uluburun shipwreck photographed outside the INA conservation laboratory in the Bodrum Castle, Turkey.
About the Isotrace Laboratory
The OXALID database is the result of the pioneering research into
the methodology and application of lead isotope provenance studies
carried out at the University of Oxford between 1975-2002, at first
in the Department of Geology (Geological Age and Isotope Research
Laboratory) and later in the Isotrace Laboratory based in the
Department of Nuclear Physics, and
eventually from 1995
part of the Research Laboratory of
Archaeology and the History of Art. These
27 years of intensive work, in collaboration with numerous
institutions and individuals, funded initially by the Stiftung
Volkswagenwerk, and later from
numerous UK Government and Charitable funds and finally by the
Institute of Aegean Prehistory (INSTAP), laid the foundations of the
lead isotope provenance methodology and resulted in a large database
of analytical isotope and elemental
analyses.
Systematic studies and applications of lead isotope provenancing
began in 1975 when a group at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik
in Heidelberg, comprising W. Gentner, G. A. Wagner and O. Müller,
invited N.H. Gale at the University of Oxford to join them in
collaborative work. This
resulted in several years of close
collaboration in the laboratory and in the field between Oxford and
Heidelberg, financed by grants from the
Stiftung Volkswagenwerk and focused on studies of the provenance of
the silver used to make ancient Greek silver coins using both trace
element and lead isotope analysis. A new and central feature of this
collaboration was the emphasis, beyond the analytical work, on
extensive fieldwork on lead–silver deposits in and around the
Aegean, involving geological and mining archaeological field work,
as well as mineralogical studies of ores and metallurgical remains.
This research was further extended at Oxford from 1979 (following
the suggestion of C. Renfrew) into all Bronze Age metal sources in
the Mediterranean and beyond. The main focus of research was to
discover the metal sources used in the eastern Mediterranean
(Greece, Cyprus, the Near East)
from 3000-1000 BC, but other
projects included studies of the
origin of European metals and pigments (UK, Bulgaria,
Italy, Spain,
France, Germany, Sweden,
Norway), Roman period metals (UK and Poland), sources of silver and
lead for dynastic Egypt, Near Eastern Hacksilber, glazed Islamic
pottery, and other materials from a wide range of periods and
places.
Zofia Stos-Gale
Noel Gale
Research funding for lead isotope research in Oxford:
1975-1978: Department of Geology, Stiftung Volkswagenwerk (Germany)
1979-1982: Ashmolean
Museum, UK Science and Engineering Research Council (SERC), (UK)
1982-1985: Department of Geology, UK Science and Engineering
Research Council (SERC) (UK)
1985-1988: Department
of Earth Sciences, Leverhulme Trust (UK)
1988-1993: Department
of Earth Sciences, British Academy (UK)
1988-1994: Department
of Nuclear Physics, SERC Committee
for Science Based
Archaeology GR/G49265: "New
archaeological applications of isotope geochemistry." This
grant, with additional funds from the former University Grants
Committee, allowed the establishment of the Isotrace Laboratory,
with a new mass spectrometer and extensive
Class 100
ultraclean laboratories. (UK)
1994-1997: Department of Nuclear Physics, UK Natural Environment
Research Council, continuation of grant GR/G49265 (UK)
1997-1999: Department
of Earth Sciences, Leverhulme Trust (UK)
1995-2001: Research
Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art, INSTAP -
Institute of Aegean Prehistory, New York and Philadelphia (USA).
Members of the Isotrace Laboratory:
Founders and Directors: Professor Noël H. Gale and Dr. Zofia Anna
Stos-Gale
Judy Houghton working in one of the Isotrace Laboratory clean rooms.
The names and institutions without whom the research in the Isotrace Laboratory would not be possible are listed on the relevant pages of the database.
Additional information
Gale NH, Stos-Gale ZA 2000. ‘Lead isotope analyses applied to
provenance studies’. In: Ciliberto E, Spoto G (eds) Modern
Analytical Methods in Art and Archaeology. Wiley, New York, pp. 503–584
Zofia Anna Stos-Gale & Noël
H. Gale, 2009. ‘Metal
provenancing using isotopes and the Oxford archaeological lead
isotope database (OXALID)’. Archaeological
and Anthropological Sciences,
Volume 1, Number 3, p. 195-213