L’expérimentation dans la pratique des archéologues du fer

• Main Author: Danielle Arribet-Deroin
• Format: Article
• Language: fra
• Published: Editions de la Maison des Sciences de l'Homme 2009-06-01
• Series: Les Nouvelles de l’Archéologie
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/nda/702

Experiments are common in archaeometallurgy. They were conducted jointly with excavations of metallurgical sites in Europe since the 1950s and they led to a better understanding of the iron direct process. Some new results and reflections on the aims and methods of experimentation are presented in these papers. Archaeometric experiments are shown to be an important means of validating hypotheses on ancient metallurgical processes. The archaeological experiments presented are varied. Some of them focus on the use of one specific ore, the “minette” of Lorraine. Others explore how to operate an induced-draught furnace and build it with clay, or how to produce iron in a two chambers furnace with perforated floor. An unrecognized post-reduction technique is studied, the “grappage” as it is called in French.