Identification of Pigments in Archaeological Ceramic and Stone Artefacts from Late Antiquity, Islamic Period and Modern Age by Raman Spectroscopy (U. Coimbra Collection)
Ulisses F. Marques, Sónia Fılıpe, Helena Catarıno, Bernardo A. Nogueira, Rui FaustoRaman (micro)-spectroscopy is nowadays one of the most powerful techniques available for the analysis of artwork objects. It provides a fast, non-invasive, inexpensive, and accurate method to find the chemical signatures of the different constituents of a given sample while preserving its integrity. In this chapter, the application of Raman (micro)-spectroscopy to the identification of decoration pigments of a series of representative objects of the archaeological collection of the Rectory of the University of Coimbra (Portugal) belonging to several historical periods, namely Late Antiquity, Islamic period and Modern Age, is described. First, the fundamentals of Raman spectroscopy are addressed concisely, focusing on the essential features that make the technique appropriate for this investigation. The objects of study are then described from the archaeological standpoint, including a brief historical description of the archaeological sites and the selected artefacts. Finally, the results of the Raman spectroscopy analyses are presented and discussed from a historical contextual perspective, highlighting the power of the used experimental approach for the examination of the objects under study.
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