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Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop, republished
In 1999, at the Dutch archaeological
education centre Wilhelminaoord, an international workshop took place, with a focus on the experimental and educational aspects of
bronze metallurgy. The proceedings, originally published in hard copy by VAEE, have been republished by EXARC.
Proceedings of the 1st International Workshop, Experimental and Educational Aspects of Bronze Metallurgy, Wilhelminaoord 18 - 22 October 1999
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***Since the 1940´s we have had a discussion in Scandinavia concerning ancient mould-making methods. The question of different methods in the production of
ceramic moulds has taken a large part in these discussions; by lost wax or by direct matrix-methods.
Cécile Veber,
Michel Pernot (FR)
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***The hoard of Farébersviller (Moselle, France) was discovered in 1991 during rescue excavations (See Image above). This set contains 130 "
bronze" artifacts, which date to the Late
Bronze Age (8th century BC).
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***An historal
technique of goldplating, described in 18th century literature, was reproduced. This cold-plating technique uses salts of
gold, produced by dissolving gold in aqua regia. these salts are then rubbed onto a silver surfaces.
Nigel Meeks (UK),
Caroline Tulp (NL) and
Anders Söderberg (SE)
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***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 make wax patterns to simulate one of...
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***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 create a realistic situation of a merowingian workshop.
Emanuela Jochum Zimmerman,
Nina Künzler Wagner and
Stefanie Osimitz (CH)
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***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 (
clay and soapstone) were carried out. The 10% tin bronze was cast at about 1100°C into slightly preheated moulds.
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***During a short internship in The Hagues Municipal
Museum, I noticed some blisters in a seventeenth century V.O.C.-dish. I thought they were gas bubbles which might have been introduced in the material during coagulation. When hammering to sheet the bubbles would take the shape of blisters which would turn visible during annealing.
1999 Wilhelminaoord Workshop
***
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.
