Archaeological Research Facility

This study examines the ink used in an archive of >50 bilingual papyri (in Greek and Demotic) written by a single scribe that were found in two crocodile mummies excavated from Tebtunis by B.P. Grenfell and A.S. Hunt in 1900.

The analysis here of 62 powdered soil samples indicates considerable variability based on the EDXRF analysis. I leave the interpretive details to you.

The analysis here of sevenpowdered samples indicates a variable composition(Table 1). The plutonicrocks vary from mafic to silicic(Table1).

The artifacts were produced with Sauceda Mountains obsidian (n=2) with one from Los Vidrios,not unlike the distribution of sources in previous studies at CPWR (Table 1 and Figure 1).

All the artifacts were produced from two of the sources in the Mule Creek Obsidian Complex, Mogollon-Datil volcanic province, western New Mexico (Antelope Creek and Mule Mountains), although obsidian from these sources are also available as secondary deposits in San Francisco and Gila River Quaternary alluvium in eastern Arizona (Shackley 1992. 1998; Shackley et al. 2018; Table 1, Figure 1, and cover image herein). The cortex on sample #12 fnmLA 187467 appears to be typical of the secondary deposit obsidian in Gila River alluvium (Shackley 1992,1998).

The Newman Dome pyroxene dacite dome complex in the Taos Plateau Volcanic Field is a prominent stone tool raw material that was used for stone tool production for at least 11,000 years throughout northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, and perhaps beyond(Boyer 2010; Newman and Nielsen 1987; Shackley 2011a; Vierra 2010; Figures1 and 2 herein). The analysis here of 24 source samples is an extension of the earlier study (Shackley 2011a) and indicates that this extensive dacite dome complex is compositionally homogeneous in trace elements at least in the northern and central portion of the dome complex

The analysis here of 21 obsidian cruciforms, and one cruciform produced from a volcanic or plutonic rock, from archaeological sites presumably from southern New Mexico and northern Chihuahua indicates a diverse provenance assemblage dominated by the northern Chihuahuan obsidian source at Sierra Fresnal (Shackley 2005). The remainder of the artifacts are produced from one of the sources in the Jemez Mountains of northern New Mexico, but likely procured from Rio Grande Quaternary alluvium (see Church 2000; Shackley 2021). A brief discussion is offered below.

The analysis here of 132 artifacts from eight sites in Inyo County within the China Lake Naval Weapons Station indicates a relatively diverse provenance assemblage dominated by West Sugarloaf dome obsidian in the Coso Volcanic Field, as in all the previous studies by this laboratory, and all the artifacts were produced entirely from Coso Volcanic Field sources, Sugarloaf, West Sugarloaf, and West Cactus Peak domes (see discussion below). No sources outside the Coso field were present.

Both the artifacts were produced from the Valles Rhyolite (Cerro del Medio) source in the Jemez Mountains, northern New Mexico (Shackley 2005; Table 1 and Figure 1 here).

The analysis here of 6 obsidian artifacts from the Early Agricultural Las Capas site in the Santa Cruz River basin in Tucson, Arizona indicates a diverse provenance assemblage with sources all from one of the major Mogollon-Datil Volcanic Province sources in western New Mexico and eastern Arizona - Cow Canyon eastern Arizona, and Antelope Creek and North Sawmill Creek at Mule Creek, western New Mexico (Shackley 2005; Shackley et al. 2018). While the sample sizes are quite different, this obsidian provenance assemblage is quite different from the nearby and mainly contemporaneous Los Pozos that exhibited an obsidian provenance assemblage from all cardinal directions