Examining the diagenetic alteration of human bone material from a range of archaeological burial sites using nuclear microscopy

Abstract

The inorganic analysis of archaeological bone material can potentially provide a wealth of information about the chronology, diet and palaeoenvironment of past populations: for example, strontium and uranium levels are used in palaeodietary and dating studies, respectively. However, the extent to which the chemical composition of bone is subject to diagenetic change during burial is open to controversy due, in part, to differences in analytical technique, bone types and burial conditions. To investigate this problem, archaeological human bone material from a number of different geological environments including Pompeii and a 12th century British ecclesiastical site, together with material from two seawater burials (The “Mary Rose” and a 6th century Mediterranean wreck) have been studied using the nuclear microprobe facility at the University of Oxford. Results using microbeam PIXE show that bone is subject to contamination from a wide range of trace elements depending on the burial conditions. Elemental maps are presented to demonstrate the distribution of trace element accumulation under different burial conditions, and the significance of this work to future trace element studies is discussed.