Red thermoluminescence of quartz and its application in dating archaeometallurgical slag

Slag is often the only relic of early pyrometallurgical processes. In archaeological research information about the age of slag deposits is needed and diflicult to obtain with traditional methods. Thermoluminescence has a great potential in this field, because the smelting process leads to a well defined resetting of the 'Luminescence Clock'. Metallurgical slag generally consists of many components, artificial secondary minerals, e.g. fayalite and glass phases usually being the dominant parts. Primary minerals, called relics, are also components or slag. Such a complex composition leads to large difficulties in palaeodose determation if the bulk slag is used. To overcome these problems defined phases of the slag have been separated. Palaeodose determination has been carried out on separated quartz fractions by 'Single Aliquot Regeneration' procedures using the 620 nm emission. The dose rate was determined by high-resolution gamma spectrometry. Alpha autoradiography was carried out to get information about the distribution of radionuclides. The study includes first dating results.