Recommendable! This is about an amazing technique to show that a 3,000 year old metal instrument was used for animal butchering and meat carving in its time.
"Used widely throughout Europe during the Bronze Age including the Britain Isles, the functional use of copper-alloy daggers has long been debated by researchers but until recently there had not been a scientific method to analyze the metal [for organic residue]. ...
In their report published in Scientific Reports, the researchers said they used a special staining solution to enable the world’s first extraction of organic residues from ten copper-alloy daggers excavated in 2017 from Pragatto, a Bronze Age settlement site in Italy. ...
In their report published in Scientific Reports, the researchers said they used a special staining solution to enable the world’s first extraction of organic residues from ten copper-alloy daggers excavated in 2017 from Pragatto, a Bronze Age settlement site in Italy. ...
Traditionally, they have been viewed as ceremonial symbols of male identity and power because many daggers were found in warrior burials, but other researchers had maintained that the daggers had multiple uses both as tools, perhaps for ritual slaughter of animals, and as weapons.
According to the researchers, the new analysis method revealed scientifically for the first time how these objects were used, for what tasks, and on what materials, and it seems to have been for the slaughtering, butchering and carving of animal livestock for meat. ...the project team developed a technique using a Picro-Sirius Red (PSR) solution which is used to stain muscle and collagen fibers. Collagen is a fiber-like protein in the body which is used to make connective tissue.
The residues highlighted by the solution were then observed under optical, digital and scanning electron microscopes, which allowed the team to identify micro-residues of collagen and associated bone, muscle and bundle tendon fibers.
The researchers believe these findings suggest the daggers had indeed come into contact with multiple animal tissues and were used to process a variety of animal carcasses. The daggers seem to have been used for slaughtering of livestock, butchering carcasses and carving the meat from the bone, the researchers concluded. ..."
From the abstract:
"The article discusses results of organic residue analysis performed on ten copper-alloy daggers from Bronze Age Pragatto, Italy, c.1550–1250 BCE. Metal daggers are widespread in Chalcolithic and Bronze Age Europe, yet their social and practical roles are still hotly debated. Are they symbolic or functional? Are they tools or weapons? How were they used? For what tasks and on what materials? The research addresses these questions through a novel application of biochemical staining and SEM–EDX analysis. The method has proved successful in extracting and identifying animal residues located on cutting edges including bone, muscle, and tendons. These are interpreted as evidence of prehistoric carcass butchering and carving. Further residues were observed on blade faces and hafting plates or tangs; these are interpreted as remnants of bone handles and sheaths, the latter made of either wood fibers or processed hide and fur. The readings proposed in the article are validated by original experiments with replica daggers, as detailed in the Supplementary Materials. The analysis and experiments shed new light on Bronze Age metal daggers, showing that they were fully functional tools (and perhaps tool-weapons) primarily utilized for the processing of animal carcasses. This original research result contributes significant knowledge towards interpreting an under-studied, yet socially salient, prehistoric metal artifact."
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