Archaeology of Organic Products
Scientific context :
The production, use and exchange of organic substances constitute one of the transversal themes of history and one of the more debated ones by the archaeological scientific community. The cultural history and the technical evolution of biological products such as food stuff, alcoholic beverages, medicinal substances, aromatic materials, beehives products (etc.) consumed and transformed by man from Protohistory to modern times are currently the basis of a multidisciplinary research involving the human sciences, natural and materials ones. The specificity of the bioarchaeology field (archaeoscience and archaeobotany) cannot replace in itself the classical methods of history and archeology (exploitation of literary sources, iconographic and material ones) but it allows the reinterpretation and the increment of the available documentation. The analytical methods adopted within the ANR Magi and the previous ANR Perhamo project represent a new methodological approach developed expressly to identify the organic substances and the production techniques used during the protohistorical and historical periods. Such methods, very effective and easy to be implemented, are still not well known to archaeologists and historians who normally face literary sources shortage problems. The contribution of such new data also offers the opportunity to solve certain problems and at the same time to widen the traditional way of making research.





The Goals of this blog :
This research blog aims at presenting to the archaeological community the multidisciplinary approach of the ORA (Organic Residue Analysis). Will be presented the results of our programs and the scientific activity of our team in the fields of historical studies, chemical and botanical analyses and experimental archaeology.