Etruscan archaeometallurgy record in sediments from the Northern Tyrrhenian Sea

The island of Elba has been known since antiquity as the major source of metals, especially iron, for the Etruscan civilisation. Unfortunately, the archaeometallurgic record of the island has been destroyed during our century so the present knowledge of this history is very poor and only historical sources constrain the timing. We present in this article indirect evidence of this activity buried in the sea deep that will shed new light on the archaeometallurgic history of the Western Mediterranean. Magnetic properties of marine sediments collected in the Corsica Channel imply enrichment in ferrimagnetic minerals and trace metals related to anthropic impact. Accelerator mass spectrometry C-14 ages suggest that the contamination started about 4000 years ago; we attribute it to emissions of fly-ash from the Etruscan smelting technologies for metal production. These results show that archaeometallurgic activity started on Elba Island in the II Millennium BC, much earlier than previously assumed. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.