Brief summary of the papers dedicated to archaeology and published in the Geopolymer Proceedings : Geopolymer 2005 and Geeopolymer ‘99
Geopolymer 2005
Synthetic stone in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia
manufacture of synthetic lava and synthetic basalt and decipherment of the C-14 Irtysen Stele (2000 B.C.)
The C-14 Irtysen Stele dating 2.000 BC (Louvre Museum, Paris) states that sculptor Irtysen did not carve but rather cast synthetic stone statues in molds. Irtysen’s knowledge is connected with the making of synthetic basalt in Mesopotamia at the same epoch, around 2000 BC. The artist ground vitreous silicates to make geopolymer binders for the production of stone artefacts. Its feasibility is verified by the manufacture of synthetic lava and several aluminosilicate geopolymeric binders developed within the frame of the European research project GEOCISTEM. Compositionally, the Geocistem synthetic lavas and the Mesopotamian synthetic basalts are similar and were processed at the same temperature (1200°C).
Why Djoser’s blue Egyptian faience tiles are not blue?
Manufacturing Djoser’s faience tiles at temperatures as low as 250°C?
30,000 blue faience tiles were found in Djoser’s funerary complex at Saqqarah (3. dynasty). It is generally assumed that the tiles underwent a self-glazing process during firing in the range of 800-850°C or by dipping in a liquid glaze. It is striking to notice that in contrary to their labelling, numerous Djoser’s tiles are not blue but grey, black, blue-green and even brown as displayed in figure 1.
SEM microanalysis shows the presence of phosphorus in the glaze that suggests the use of the blue mineral turquoise (mafkat), an aluminium-copper phosphate, intensively extracted by pharaoh Djoser in the Sinai mines. Our aim was to replicate the self-glazing process with a soluble silicate binder (a geopolymer glaze) involving a synthetic turquoise (mafkat) mixture made of pure aluminium phosphate hydrate and copper phosphate hydrate. We were astonished to get a turquoise blue-self-glazed ceramic, stable and identical to Egyptian faience, at a temperature as low as 250°C. Post treatment at 350°C changes the blue colour into grey-black (chemical transformation of blue copper phosphate into black tenorite CuO) that remains stable up to 800°C, where it turns back to blue. Did Djoser’s ceramists use this low temperature process? Apparently yes, if we look at all the colours that we have replicated at self-glazing temperatures in the range of 250-350°C
Latest analysis on pyramid stones supporting Joseph Davidovits’ theory
A) PIXE, PIGE and NMR studies;
B) Microstructural investigations;
C) Synchrotron radiation;
D) The making of pyramid stones
The abstracts relate to the actual research being carried out by various teams of scientists. Any one of these researches relates to the artificial nature of the analysed pyramid stones. It is an ongoing research with papers already published or to be published in major international scientific journals. They will be posted in the NEWS as soon as they are published.
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