Fresh Take on a Gold Treasure's Origins Using Geochemistry

The Treasure of El Carambolo, a collection of 7th century BCE gold jewelry, has provoked archaeologic debate for decades. Since its accidental discovery 60 years ago inside a vase near Seville, Spain, studies of the ancient jewelry have suggested two conflicting stories of origin set thousands of kilometers apart. Recently, researchers used techniques more commonly found in the geosciences to try to locate precisely where the gold was mined and have come up with a third option. “The origin of the gold need not be from thousands of kilometers away, in the Atlantic or eastern Mediterranean,” said anthropologist Francisco Nocete of Universidad de Huelva in Spain and lead researcher on the new analysis. Instead, Nocete’s analysis suggests a much more local origin for the gold: the ancient economic and political hub of Valencina de la Concepción, located a mere 2 kilometers from El Carambolo. Nocete and his team used a combination of Read more