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This thesis considers the early copper and copper-alloy metallurgy of the entire Circum-Alpine region. It introduces a new approach to the interpretation of chemical composition data sets, which has been applied to a comprehensive regional database for the first time. An extensive use of GIS has been applied to investigate the role of topography in the distribution of metal and to undertake spatial and geostastical analysis that may highlight patterns of distribution of some specific key compositional element. The Circum-Alpine Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age show some distinctively different patterns of metal use, which can be interpreted through changes in mining and social choices. But there are also some signs of continuity, in particular those which respect the use of major landscape features such as watersheds and river systems. Interestingly, the Alpine range does not act as a north-south barrier, as major differences in composition tend to appear on an east-west axis. Conversely, the river system seems to have a key role in the movement of metal. Geostastical analyses demonstrate the presence of a remelting process, applicable also in the case of ingots; evidence that opens new and interesting questions about the role of ingots and hoards in the distribution of metal at the beginning of the Metal Age. New tools and new analysis may also be useful to identify zones where there was a primary metal production and zones where metal was mostly received and heavily manipulated.

1 Odler, Martin 2020: The social context of copper in Ancient Egypt down to the end of Middle Kingdom. PhD thesis. Prague: Charles University, Faculty of Arts. Supervisor: Prof. Mgr. Miroslav Bárta, Dr. Abstract The subject of the doctoral thesis is a reconstruction of the chaîne opératoire of copper in ancient Egypt from its earliest occurrence in the fourth millennium BC until the end of the Middle Kingdom. As copper was the metal most widely used in ancient Egyptian society, its study can offer statistical "big data" otherwise rarely available for ancient cultures. Three large groups of sources are discussed successively: written and iconographic sources, archaeological sources (material culture, i.e. artefacts), and archaeometallurgical sources, divided into several consecutive stages of the chaîne opératoire. Copper was named bjA and read [byr] in the periods under study, while an interpretation as arsenical copper with a low and high content of arsenic, respectively, is proposed for so- called Asian copper and Hsmn. In the Middle Kingdom, the term Hsmn begun to be used also for tin bronze. The word for crucible was bD(.t) and the word for metalworker (incorporating both metallurgists and smiths) was bD.ty. There is no substantial Egyptian evidence from the periods under study for the current...