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Using negative muons as a probe for depth profiling silver Roman coinage
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Hampshire, Bethany, Butcher, Kevin, Ishida, Katsu, Green, George, Paul, Don McK. and Hillier, Adrian (2019) Using negative muons as a probe for depth profiling silver Roman coinage. Heritage, 2 (1). pp. 400-407. doi:10.3390/heritage2010028
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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/heritage2010028
Abstract
Debasement of silver Roman coins is a well-known phenomenon and understanding the quality of ancient silver coinages can provide an idea about the underlying fiscal condition of the issuing states. These coins are made from a silver-copper alloy, the surfaces of which were deliberately enhanced at the mints by a process of surface-enrichment to give them the appearance of being made of pure silver. Therefore, any surface analysis would provide a composition of the silver-copper alloy that would not be representative of the original alloy from which the coin blank was made; the result would be too high in silver. However, the bulk of the sample, the interior, should provide a composition that is true to the original alloy. Elemental analysis using negative muons has been used to provide a depth dependent compositional, completely non-destructive analysis of a silver-copper alloy denarius of the empress Julia Domna datable to 211–217 CE. The composition of the coin, beyond the surface enrichment layer, is 51 ± 1.8 % copper and 49 ± 1.9% silver, taken at a muon depth of 402 ± 61 µm. The surface enrichment layer is approximately 190 µm thick.
| Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||||||||||
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| Subjects: | C Auxiliary Sciences of History > CB History of civilization Q Science > QC Physics |
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| Divisions: | Faculty of Arts > Classics and Ancient History | ||||||||||||
| Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Coins, Roman, Silver coins, Muons | ||||||||||||
| Journal or Publication Title: | Heritage | ||||||||||||
| Publisher: | M D P I AG | ||||||||||||
| ISSN: | 2050-7445 | ||||||||||||
| Official Date: | 29 January 2019 | ||||||||||||
| Dates: |
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| Volume: | 2 | ||||||||||||
| Number: | 1 | ||||||||||||
| Page Range: | pp. 400-407 | ||||||||||||
| DOI: | 10.3390/heritage2010028 | ||||||||||||
| Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||||||||
| Publication Status: | Published | ||||||||||||
| Access rights to Published version: | Open Access | ||||||||||||
| RIOXX Funder/Project Grant: |
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