Cast iron objects recovered primarily in eastern Mongolia, spanning the Xiongnu through the Early Historic periods (ca. 3rd BC–AD 17th century), were examined for their radiocarbon (14C) concentration and microstructure. Most of the samples examined were found to have originated from charcoal-based smelting with a few exceptions that were made using a mineral coal-based technique. A comparison of 14C dates with dates derived from artifact typology allowed the charcoal-smelted objects to be classified into two groups, based on whether the radiometric and typological periodization are in agreement or not. In addition, those with differing 14C and typological dates can be divided into two subgroups with and without evidence for a melt treatment applied after original casting. These conflicting dating results are confusing and would seem to provoke skepticism about the use of 14C measurements for dating iron artifacts. We demonstrate however that 14C analysis, when combined with metallographic examination and other lines of chronological evidence, can clarify the history of a given iron object and its multiple users, often separated in time by more than a millennium.
ABSTRACT.A method of thermal and acid treatments was developed at the Archaeo-metallurgy Laboratory of Hongik University in Korea to extract carbon from cast iron, and carbon objects thus prepared from cast iron artifacts of ancient Korea were dated at the University of Arizona's AMS Facility. The thermal treatments consist of heating a specimen to ~1000 C in a controlled environment with reduced oxygen potential, then cooling it rapidly to room temperature. The heating causes the cementite phase in white cast iron to be graphitized and the quenching suppresses pearlite formation. The specimen then consists of flakes of graphite embedded in a matrix of martensite. The next stage of the treatment is to dissolve the martensite matrix in a solution of nitric and hydrochloric acids to release the graphite as a powder. This material is then cleaned, dried, and pressed into target holders for accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) analysis. The method was applied to a collection of artifacts from the Korean Three Kingdoms period (about AD 300-668) and the AMS results were compared with chronological estimates from other means.
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