casting
Observations on Italian Bronze Age Sword Production: The Archaeological Record and Experimental Archaeology
***In spite of the very large quantity of Bronze Age swords in Northern Italy, only a few stone moulds have been found. Tests have shown that carving such big stone moulds (more than 60 cm long) requires a large amount of raw material, deep knowledge and skill, rather than a wide set of implements...
From Wax to Metal: An Experimental Approach to the Chaîne Opératoire of the Bronze Disk from Urdiñeira
***The so-called ‘Treasure of A Urdiñeira‘ (A Gudiña, south-east of the province of Ourense, Spain) consists of an assemblage of three metal artefacts: two gold bracelets and a bronze button or disk, dated from the transition between the Late Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age...
The Quality of the Craft
Precision Lost Wax Casting
***The limits of precision casting were explored experimentally at the Bronze Casting Workshop at Wilhelminaoord, the Netherlands, by making wax models, moulds and lost wax castings using essentially early metalworking conditions. Geometrically patterned models of Dark Age type dies were used to...
The Experimental Reconstruction in Bronze of a Merovingian Treasure Box from Sixth Century A.D.
***Considerations about a lost ancient fabrication technique of bronze attachements from a merowingian treasure box pointed out that practical experiments had to be done to reconstruct the cast and coldwork. A self made oven and mould sould help to...
From the Object to the Mould: Is there a Connection between Microstructure of a Cast Bronze Object and its Mould Material Used?
***The question studied within the framework of the Wilhelminaoord Workshop was: In which way the mould material does influence the cast structure of a bronze object? For this, casts in two different mould materials...
Producing Silver Sheet According to Cellini
Experiment
When the subject of techniques of reproduction was raised these questions came back to me. Casting a slab of silver and subsequently hammering it might be a way to answer some of these questions. This would involve following the suggestions of certain treatises in combination with scientific research.
Interview: Dr Rosemarie Leineweber
Ancient Repairs on Bronze Objects
***Bronze objects can be damaged in many ways, for example during casting or during their time of use. Often this damage was repaired using various techniques. In this paper, some examples of ancient repairs and their techniques are described and illustrated with examples published in the literature...