EXAMINING THE DIAGENETIC ALTERATION OF HUMAN BONE MATERIAL FROM A RANGE OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL BURIAL SITES USING NUCLEAR MICROSCOPY

The inorganic analysis of archaeological bone material can potentially provide a wealth of information about the chronology, diet and palaeo environment of past populations: for example, strontium and uranium le vels are used in palaeodietary and dating studies, respectively. Howev er, the extent to which the chemical composition of bone is subject to diagenetic change during burial is open to controversy due, in part, to differences in analytical technique, bone types and burial conditio ns. To investigate this problem, archaeological human bone material fr om a number of different geological environments including Pompeii and a 12th century British ecclesiastical site, together with material fr om two seawater burials (The ''Mary Rose'' and a 6th century Mediterra nean wreck) have been studied using the nuclear microprobe facility at the University of Oxford. Results using microbeam PIXE show that bone is subject to contamination from a wide range of trace elements depen ding on the burial conditions. Elemental maps are presented to demonst rate the distribution of trace element accumulation under different bu rial conditions, and the significance of this work to future trace ele ment studies is discussed.