12 MeV Proton Activation Analysis combined to IBA techniques for compositional studies of various archeological artefacts from Roman and Merovingian sites (Ostia Antica, Artena, Nevers)

A combination of 3MeV proton PIXE-PIGE, MA-XRF and 10-15 MeV proton activation analysis has been recently applied on the external beam line of the cyclotron of IPNAS/CEA laboratory from the University of Liège, and thus, to a wide variety of archaeological specimens (glass, pottery, mortars and pigments) all provided by on-going studies and excavations of housing materials, wall decorations, and vessels led on two remarkable Roman sites and one Medieval site: First, from an important agricultural complex excavated on an artificial terrace from a republican town, Artena, located, 40 km South-East from Rome, near the Via Latina and the Campania; second, from the Domus dei bucrani, a house dating from the end of the Republican era discovered on the site of the Schola of the Trajan at Ostia Antica and third, from the sixth-century glass mosaic from Saint Etienne church in Nevers, France. The aim of the present work is to explore and report the specific analytical interests of Charge Particle Activation Analysis implemented with protons ranging from 10 to 15 MeV, as a non-invasive analytical technique for the detection of elements with Z = 11–40 and beyond, and to address its suitability to solve questions raised by archaeologists. We present in this paper the preliminary results obtained following methodologies reported in recent pioneering and more recent works and emphasize on the achieved sensitivities (Limits of Detections) for elements as Ca, Ti, V, Cr, Fe, Cu, Zn, As, Sr, Y, Zr and Sb ranging from percentage to parts per million (ppm) levels.