CTV:ARCHAEOBOTANY

Charcoal | Seeds | Pollen

The archaeobotanical aspect of the Central Timna Valley (CTV) Project is spearheaded by Dr. Dafna Langutt (langgut@post.tau.ac.il) from the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University.

Cahrcoal

One of the most intriguing questions regarding the copper smelting sites in the deserts of the southern Levant is the source of fuel used to operate the smelting furnaces.

Aims
The goal of this research is to investigate whether the spectra of fuel species change or remain constant over periods of metallurgical activity in the south Arava Valley. Are changes in the plants that were used for fuel a result of environmental change? Cultural change?

Method
The spectra of fuel species will be reconstructed based on the identification of charcoal remains that have been collected from metallurgical activity areas by both dry and wet sifting.

sieving

Dry sieving sediments from Slag Mound 19 at Site 34 (2013) - mostly for charcoal, seeds, and animal remains

dafna

Sieving for botanical materials from the main slag mound at Site 30 (2013)

wet-sieve

wet-sieve2

Wet sieving sedimnets from Site 34 (2013)

charcoal-lab

Preparing a reference collection

charcoal-thinsection

Preparing thin sections for microscopic analysis of charcoal samples (species identification)