Source Provenance of Pre-Historic Granitic Grindstones: The Case Study of the Cogotas I Archaeological Site of Arroyo Mucientes/San Lázaro (Castronuño, Valladolid) and a Proposal on the General Methodological Flow Process

The occurrence of hand grindstones at the Cogotas I archaeological sites is considered to be a common feature. Given that a distant-provenance raw material is frequently involved, determination of its source is a basic factor in the search for a better understanding of resource management and for any Political Economy approach. To progress in these directions an overall study should be planned, using selected grindstones with a view to covering diverse sub-zones of the Cogotas I dispersal area, especially because of its considerable distance from the granite basement source. Such a study may today includes diverse analytical procedures combining successive geographic, petrographic, mineralogical and geochemical criteria. To check the plausibility of the proposed methodology, a preliminary test has been carried out on two granite grindstones, obtained at the archaeological excavation at the Castronuño (Valladolid) Cogotian site, which is fifty km away from an inferred source area that was presumably located at Peñausende (Zamora). The result obtained validates the proposed operational process, yielding a generalizable knowledge to other similar situations.

El color en los códices prehispánicos del México Central: identificación material, cualidad plástica y valor estético

Este artículo investiga algunos de los valores plásticos y estéticos que presidieron la selección y la preparación de las materias colorantes empleadas para iluminar los códices creados por los nahuas del México Central durante el Posclásico Tardío. Estos códices son interesantes porque análisis arqueométricos y exámenes codicológicos recientes han permitido conocer la materialidad de su capa pictórica, así como las características formales y el comportamiento de los colores en estas obras. Uno de los aportes trascendentales de estos estudios ha sido averiguar que la paleta cromática que sirvió para pintar los códices del México Central era principalmente de origen orgánico, lo que contrasta con la naturaleza de los pigmentos detectados en restos de pintura mural y en esculturas creadas por los nahuas que son sobre todo minerales. El objetivo de este artículo es reflexionar sobre las razones de esas diferencias y demostrar que el uso de los colorantes orgánicos en los códices respondía a un fin plástico específico que concordaba con el canon estético imperante en la sociedad náhuatl.

Una prueba de la técnica multi-espécimen para determinar paleointensidad utilizando material arqueomagnetico: resultados preliminares con arcillas quemadas Tunecinas

The multispecimen palaeointensity technique of Dekkers & Böhnel (2006) has been tested on archaeomagnetic material from five kilns from Tunisia. In a previous study all five kilns yielded good quality archaeointensities based on Thellier-type double heating experiments. Results obtained using the multispecimen technique compared well with the previously studied Thellier-type results, with a slight tendency towards lower values. Markedly lower values were observed in two kilns, results that were improved by increasing the proportion of the natural remanence remagnetised in the partial thermoremanence acquisition. One of the kilns showed a multicomponent remanence (due to partial heating) and gave relatively poor results.