Arsenical copper tools of Old Kingdom Giza craftsmen: First data

Provenance reinterpretation of some early Egyptian copper alloy artefacts

“…A comparison to earlier published data reveals, inter alia, a high similarity (but no overlap) in terms of (highly radiogenic) LI ratios between a 3 rd Dynasty axe from Bêt Khallaf (E.00914a: Rademakers et al 2018) and outlier G29 (a needle: Odler et al 2021), although they differ markedly in terms of arsenic, silver, antimony and nickel concentrations (cobalt and selenium concentrations are comparable). This variability may infer variations within the Sinai deposit from which this metal was probably produced and the process by which they were smelted, and/or represent variation introduced through alloying (arsenic, antimony, lead concentrations -cfr.…”

“…In support of their suggested dating of artefact E.09225, Odler et al (2021) note the isotopic similarity of the Elkab object with 3 rd Dynasty artefacts from Bet Khallaf published by Rademakers et al (2018) -who already identified and discussed this similarity. Odler et al state that the object is dated to the 1 st Dynasty "although it was isotopically more similar to Dynasty-3 objects from Bet Khallaf, made of Sinaitic ore (Rademakers et al 2018b, p. 179)".…”

“…The above contextual discussion has further bearing on the provenance interpretation of early Egyptian copper alloy artefacts. In this section, we suggest some further nuance to recent interpretations offered by Odler et al (2021) for Old Kingdom artefacts from Giza, and that of the Elkab chisel discussed above.…”

“…However, there is no reason to assume 3 that the metal of which these artefacts was made derives from a single source or source region (even if this may be case). This perspective is similarly apparently low lead content of copper ores in Sinai (Abdel-Motelib et al 2012, Pfeiffer 2013, Rademakers et al 2018, 2020 -frequently (far) below the detection limits reported by Kmošek et al (2018) and Odler et al (2021) for lead (1000 and 500 g/g). This is most likely due to their use of very small samples: 30-50 g or less.…”

“…For this reason, we expressly focus on the characteristics of individual artefacts, before expanding into comparisons within and across contexts and time periods. In this regard, it is helpful to consider the number of copper alloy artefacts for which both LI ratio and trace element data have been determined so far for the Predynastic to the end of the Old Kingdom periods, a timeframe spanning over two millennia: 11 artefacts from Maadi, Sheikh Mukhsen and Northern Sinai (Abdel-Motelib et al 2012 and references therein), 13 from Tell el-Farkha 7 (Rehren and Pernicka 2014), 40 from various sites (Rademakers et al 2018), 15 from various sites (Kmošek et al 2018), 10 from Giza (Odler et al 2021), 1 from Kafr Hassan Dawood (Hassan et al 2015) and 3 Nubian A artefacts (Anfinset 2010). These 93 objects (and counting), many of them tiny, can hardly be expected to cover the variability in copper alloys circulating across ancient Egypt over a period of more than 2000 years.…”