Rare earth elements as tracers for provenancing ancient ceramics

Resumo

Clay analysis plays a crucial role in studies of ancient ceramics, contributing with answers to better understanding resource exploitation strategies, production technologies, and regional and interregional interaction patterns. The vessels are made essentially by clays, the composition of the ceramics reflecting the origin of the clay materials used and conclusions may be inferred concerning the type of raw materials and the establishment of the geographic area of production. Different geochemical patterns found in clays from different geological contexts, consist on an important basis for the comparison with ceramics since the identification of the clays used for productions can contribute to delimit a potential area of clay resources and thus establishing provenance. This is particularly useful when no archaeological evidence of production exists. REE patterns are very important for the characterization of ceramic productions and their relation with raw materials, as subtle variations between them reflect differences in their relative behaviour in response to the chemical environment, making this group particularly useful in geochemistry studies. So, REE are crucial trace elements to pursue studies of raw materials and provenance establishment and trade routes reconstruction in ancient times.