Pre-Hispanic ceramics analyzed using PIXE and radiographic techniques

• Published in: Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section B, Beam interactions with materials and atoms Beam interactions with materials and atoms, 2011-12, Vol.269 (24), p.3025-3031
• Main Authors: Lima, S.C., Rizzutto, M.A., Added, N., Barbosa, M.D.L., Trindade, G.F., Fleming, M.I.D.A.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Aluminum; Beams (radiation); Ceramics; Conservation; Culture; Radiography; X-rays
• ISSN: 0168-583X; 1872-9584
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nimb.2011.04.064

Ceramics objects are the most common artifacts found during excavation of archaeological sites and often depicts cultural habits and manufacturing technologies of the culture. The determination of macroscopic and microscopic characteristics of the ceramic objects such as the ceramic porosity, addition of tempers in the clay, main chemical components and the trace elements present in the ceramic can reveal many aspects about the manufacturing processes used by the culture, its degree of development, the provenance of the raw materials and the exchange networks. Also the radiography can help to investigate the manufactured processes, the size of the tempers used and the conservation status of the artifacts. In this present work two non-destructive techniques, radiography and PIXE (Particle Induced X-ray Emission) were used to characterize one set of thirty-six pre-Hispanic ceramic pieces from the Chimu Culture conserved in the Museu de Arqueologia e Etnologia (MAE/USP). The PIXE analyses performed in the external beam setup at LAMFI (Laboratório de Análise de Materiais por Feixes Iônicos) allowed measure the principal chemical elements such as Al, Si, K, Ti, Fe and Ca, present in this group of pieces. X-ray imagings allowed identify the manufacture processes, the granularity of the tempers used, as well as the similarity and the differences between the pieces studied.