Seeing Beneath the Finds
[pg32]Those of you who follow our TikTok channel will have seen the video discussing some iron items I was taking to be X-rayed, to better understand their function. It is often the case that as a curator I will come across corroded lumps of iron which have been sat in our collections and not fully identified.
Thanks to James Elliot, Senior Lecturer in Radiography at Canterbury Christ Church, I have been able to utilise their X-Ray suite to study a number of objects from excavations the society have been assisting with at Lympne, as well as a Roman Adze found during excavations by Graeme Horner and Lt.Col Meates at Lullingstone Park’s The Pimple. The X-Ray is fired at 70kV (the strength of the ray) and 5mAs (the number of images taken). This is an excellent tool for identifying corroded metal artefacts especially those made of Iron.
[fg]jpg|Fig 1. Roman Adze X-ray|Image[/fg]
[fg]jpg|Fig 2. Lympne X-ray|Image[/fg]
One of the key items I wanted to examine under X-Ray was a long, iron object which had been identified on site as an anthropomorphic knife handle. However, although the head did appear to have an animalistic shape, there was no way of fitting a blade to it as would be expected of a knife. The item shows up brilliantly on the X-ray, however there is clearly not a worked animal head present, nor any clue as to its purpose! Although a disappointing result in it not being an anthropomorphic knife handle, the benefit of having the object X-rayed means that we have a digital record of the object in its current condition which we can compare to any later corrosion or degradation of the object.
There is also the advantage of storage. For local groups who may uncover numerous iron nails in various states of corrosion, X-rays present an ideal solution to storage, if they can arrange it. Once iron nails have been scanned and a digital record created, they can, in theory be ethically disposed of, saving on storage. It is however, always advisable to keep a small sample for future researchers.