Illuminating the Late Mesolithic: residue analysis of 'blubber' lamps from Northern Europe

Description

No / Shallow oval bowls used on the Baltic coast in the Mesolithic have been suggested as oil lamps, burning animal fat. Here researchers confirm the use of four coastal examples as lamps burning blubber-the fat of marine animals, while an inland example burned fat from terrestrial mammals or freshwater aquatics-perhaps eels. The authors use a combination of lipid biomarker and bulk and single-compound carbon isotope analysis to indicate the origin of the residues in these vessels.

Links & Downloads

1. Heron CP, Andersen S, Fischer A et al (2013) Illuminating the Late Mesolithic: residue analysis of 'blubber' lamps from Northern Europe. Antiquity. 87(335): 178-188.
2. http://hdl.handle.net/10454/9024
3. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003598X00048705

Tags

Baltic

Mesolithic-neolithic

Ertebolle

Pottery

Blubber lamps

Lipid analysis

Marine oils

Archaeological pottery vessels

Marine animal products

Fatty-acids

Chromatographic analysis

Organic residues

South-Africa

Oil lamps

Commodities

Traces

Fish

Additional Fields

Identifer	oai:union.ndltd.org:BRADFORD/oai:bradscholars.brad.ac.uk:10454/9024
Date	January 2013
Creators	Heron, Carl P., Andersen, S.H., Fischer, Anders, Glykou, A., Hartz, S., Saul, H., Steele, Valerie J., Craig, O.E.
Source Sets	Bradford Scholars
Language	English
Detected Language	English
Type	Article, No full-text in the repository