Metallurgy in the Merovingian settlement of Oegstgeest- An inventarisation of the evidence for early medieval ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy

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Archeologie (BA)

Talma, Marianne (2012)

Metallurgy in the Merovingian settlement of Oegstgeest- An inventarisation of the evidence for early medieval ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy

Bachelor thesis | Archeologie (BA)

A few years ago a well-preserved Early Medieval (Merovingian) settlement was discovered near the banks of the river the Old Rhine that will play a vital part in the understanding of the habitational history in the coastal area in this period. These remains are threathened by development plans, which is why a large-scale excavation is taking place and will continue untill circa 2014. The central question in this thesis is wheter metallurgy was practiced in this settlement and if so, which metals were used. A majority of the metallic and metallurgy related finds have been examined. Besides (iron)slagmaterial a couple of crucibles and fragments thereof have been found, that point to the casting of unnoble metals. For this end they recycled material from existing objects. The motivation for the use of brass could be its gold colour. Concerning the slagmaterial the evidence seems to point more at the smithing of iron than iron production.