Lead isotope data, together with an evaluation of previously published results for the chemical composition of Omani ores and copper‐base artefacts are used to define a material signature of Omani copper. Absent from our group of Bronze Age metal (Umm an Nar and Wadi Suq periods) are the signature of ores from Masirah Island and also from the vast deposits in north Oman inland from Suhar. Contemporaneous copper from Bahrain and from Tell Abraq on the Gulf coast is consistent in its material signature with Omani copper; a derivation from Omani ores of this copper is highly likely. A few exceptions at Tell Abraq point to Faynan/Timna in the southern Levant as a possible source region. Among Mesopotamian artefacts the signature of Omani copper is encountered during all cultural periods from Uruk at the end of the fourth millennium BC to Akkadian 1000 years later. Oman/Magan appears to have been particularly important during Early Dynastic III and Akkadian when about half of the copper in circulation bears the Omani signature.

Le rôle du feu, utilisé principalement pendant des millénaires pour extraire les roches dures avant l'introduction de la poudre noire, est décrit et ses effets naturels sont examinés. Les données archéologiques et historiques sont utilisées pour voir leur ancienneté et la manière dont le feu a servi dans différentes situations. Des exemples préhistoriques provenant d'Europe, du Moyen- Orient et d'Extrême-Orient viennent appuyer les données peu nombreuses du Proche-Orient.

Near Eastern fieldwork in mining archaeology and archaeometallurgy began at Timna (Israel) in the 1960s and 1970s and continued in Feinan (Jordan) in the 1980s and 1990s. For the first time, Bronze Age copper mines were excavated and cleared and importance was given to the slag recovered. At both sites copper was produced for over 5000 years, from the Chalcolithic to the Mamluk periods. Although the broad outlines of technical development can be traced, much remains to be learned in future studies.

Cherchant des données nouvelles sur la localisation de l'ancien pays sumérien du cuivre Makan, le Musée Allemand des Mines a prouvé que la plupart des anciens sites de fonderies de l'Oman appartiennent à l'époque islamique ancienne. Dans un des rares sites du 3ème millénaire B.C. les fouilles montrent le développement depuis une fonderie pré-industrielle jusqu'à un caravansérail. Comme les trouvailles métallurgiques furent si nombreuses, la reconstitution des procédés deffusion fut possible. Il est montré, que le minerai sulfuré fut exploité etrtransfor- mé en au moins 4 phases en une matte, puis en creuset jusqu'au cuivre. La découverte unique'de speiss arsenical est d'un intérêt particulier.

Some 20 years ago the Ministry of National Heritage and Culture received an important collection of planoconvex copper ingots, tools and anthropomorphic figures which came from a site at al-Aqir near Bahlā' in the al-Zāhirah Wilāya. Several years elapsed before their provenance could be reconstructed and the site could be investigated. The finds had been deposited as building offerings in a prehistoric, 300 m-long dam built to trap soil and moisture for agricultural purposes. Although the area has been intensively used since at least 3000 BC, the evidence for irrigation installations does not pre-date 2000 BC. The finds are dedicatory rather than functional in nature.