Technological and Functional Approaches Applied to Miniature Vessels with Pigment Traces: Two Middle Bronze Age Case Studies from Eastern Subcarpathians of Romania

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Technological and Functional Approaches of the Miniature Vessels with Pigment Traces: Two Middle Bronze Age Case Studies from Eastern Subcarpathians of Romania

 

The article has its points of interest, mainly because very little attention hasbeen paid, so far, to these small pots and their possible functions, so it is welcome. In my opinion, however, it is quite too long, a demanding reading in relationship to its contents. In the opinion of the present reviewer, in order to discuss the contents of two miniature pots perhaps it is not necessary to deal at length with the geology of an entire region, nor to describe the full archaeological framework of the discovery sites, nor to explain in an entire page what is ochre - something everybody knows. I have some questions on how the paper has been organized, some of the illustrations, and the choices in matter of the applied analytical techniques (see specific comments below).

The article is certainly useful, but cutting its length by 30/40% would noticeably increase its legibility and overall impact - in first place, in the interest of you authors.

 

The introduction, up to line 46 of p. 2, perhaps can be noticeably shortened - considerations are rather generic and not too crucial.

 

Fig. 2. One cannot really appreciate the scale of the pots, images are too little. If the illustration might be re-arranged vertically, probably pots will be better visible and Fig. 2 would be much improved.

 

Lines 138-141: what exactly might be the relationship between sites set in a dominant position and the use of miniature vessels with pigments? Explain or cancel, otherwise the paragraph remains quite odd. 

 

Lines 149-154: is the hypothesis of "ritual killing" of the small pots really worth mentioning? It is rather unlikely and furthermore impossible to test. Even more because later, lines 360-361, and again at lines 491-492, burning is considered the result of a precise technical action related to the preparation of pigments. I would cancel the paragraph.

 

Fig. 5 is small and dark, one cannot see at the proposed scale the red spots and inner layer mentioned in text. The dark section attached to the photograph, too, does not help.

 

Considering what follows, "Figure 6. The miniature vessel from Siliștea-Pe Cetățuie settlement: a. The context of the discovery;. 303 b. Plan detail; c. Profile detail": b is just an enlargement of a; the terms "plan" and "profile" in this captions are not proper.

 

Line 307: "... a series of interdisciplinary analyses such as 307 SEM-EDX and μ-FTIR". Two analytical approaches do not make a series...And an immediate question: why you did not use XRD, a much more immediate and effective way of defining the mineral composition of pigments?

 

Line 338: "Thus, the samples that were taken were very small (1-2 cm)": in archaeometry these would be relatively large samples, not small.

 

The colorimetric part does not seem so useful, after all. 

 

Some parts of the Discussion, mentioning other colored artifacts, in my view should be moved to a separate "state of the art" introductory paragraph.

 

Lines 532-535 and following: the inference that the miniature pots/pigments were used in rituals is arbitrary. Why not daily used cosmetics, or any other activity, even mondane, involving the use of colors?

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you for your revision!

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper provides a very thorough treatment of its subject, with the context and scientific analyses very well presented. Miniature vessels are a common phenomenon so the paper should be of interest to archaeologists working in other areas. The English is generally good but there is a serious problem with the first paragraph of the Introduction, which is almost incomprehensible (hence my evaluation above of the introduction). This paragraph must be revised before publication.

Author Response

Thank you for your revision!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

This paper deals with the analysis of pigment residues in miniature vessels from the Middle Bronze Age in a region of Romania. The case study is particularly interesting and well contextualised from an archaeological point of view.

 

The introduction is interesting, but very long and already anticipates some of the results. In my opinion, this information could be removed, also to make the text more readable.

The materials and methods section is complete.

The results section is clear for the microscopy and colorimetry parts. The infrared analysis part, on the other hand, needs a lot of revision and correction, in my opinion.

The discussion is clear.

The conclusions are not very concise, some concepts already repeated several times could be eliminated or summarised.

 

The cited bibliography is adequate, self-citations are 13 out of 77 (about 17%).

 

The English language is generally good, a general check to correct typos or sentence construction errors may be sufficient.

 

Below are some specific comments:

 

Line 51

Study area and archaeological background

I think this should be highlighted as a title.

 

Line 76

'Also' should not be underlined. This could also be removed from the beginning of the sentence, because it is already there at the end of the sentence ('were also reported').

 

Figure 1

The figure is very effective, but unfortunately the labels with the site numbers are difficult to read. You could try increasing the font size or writing them in a darker colour.

 

Figure 2

Again, the picture is very effective, but unfortunately you cannot read the bar scales. Is it possible to make them more legible or, if they are all the same, to specify their size in the caption?

 

Line 155

Geology and mineralogy

I think this should be highlighted as a title.

 

Line 196

"Limonite, is a generic term"

I think the comma should be removed.

 

Line 202

"Limonite it is not"

'Limonite' must be removed, or 'it'.

 

Line 224

Case studies from Eastern Romania

I think this should be highlighted as a title.

 

Lines 270-271

"several unburnt rectangular housing structures were discovered were discovered several unburnt rectangular housing structures"

Please remove the repetitions.

 

Line 321

"Μ-FTIR"

Replace with 'μ-FTIR'.

 

Line 325

"close IR"

What do you mean by 'close IR'?

 

Line 326

"cm-1"

Watch out for superscripts.

 

 

Line 360

"The hypothesis of the using a heating source"

Please check this sentence.

 

Lines 370-371

" the mineral components, represented mainly by quartz, iron oxides, limonite being also identified"

How did you identify them? With what technique? Perhaps it is better to specify this for the sake of clarity.

 

Line 415

"and on its outside"

How come you can see so much iron even on the outer surface? I would always specify that these are red stains, otherwise you might think it is the material the object is made of.

 

Line 427

"analyzing three areas of the sample"

In this case, it is only internal areas, right?

 

 

Lines 443-444

"the one specific to kaolinite [47, 52, 54] at 3528 cm-1 is highlighted."

Characteristic peaks for the identification of kaolinite are generally found at around 3690, 3655 and 3620 cm-1, but are not seen here: why is this? Ochres also often show a characteristic peak at 913 cm-1, again attributable to kaolinite, but this too does not appear to be present in these spectra.

 

Line 445

"The obvious peaks at 2926 cm-1 and 2859 cm-1 correspond to organic carbon"

No, the sentence put in this way suggests that the peaks are due to elemental carbon, which obviously shows no signals in the infrared region. Instead, these peaks are due to organic compounds that contain C-H bonds.

 

Lines 450-451

"Carbonates [60, 61] are visible in the 1300-1500 cm-1 range, and were identified only on the inner surface by the presence of an intense peak around the 1300 cm-1"

What kind of carbonates? The peak at 1322 cm-1 is a little too low-lying to be calcium carbonate, which could instead be attributed to the peak at 1422 cm-1.  Unfortunately, the other two characteristic peaks at 875 and 713 cm-1 are not visible, so the attribution remains uncertain. Given the shape of the peak and the presence of organic matter, have you not considered the hypothesis that the peak at 1322 cm-1 could be attributed to calcium oxalate?

 

Line 452

"Silicates are represented by the intense peaks at 1984 cm-1 and 1867 cm-1"

Are you sure? What is the bibliographical reference for these attributions?

 

Line 467-468

"the presence of kaolinite [47, 52, 54] is highlighted through multiple peaks from 3504-3585 cm-1."

See previous comment on the characteristic peaks of kaolinite.

 

Line 470

"and calcite [57] is visible at 2512 cm-1."

Exactly, and you can also see the peaks at 872 and 1794 cm-1.

 

Figure 16

This is a reflection spectrum, right?

Looking at the shape of the spectrum, I have my doubts that the peak at 1158 cm-1 is actually the valley of two inverted peaks at about 1100 and 1200 cm-1.

 

Lines 558-560

"Thus, based on our ratios, which are 1/2 – 1/8, their source can be established, and according to the results obtained after comparing these values, the provenance of the pigments used was identified as being from the Iacobeni area."

Generally, provenance studies are also performed considering trace elements, minor elements, and rare earth elements. Attributing a provenance on the basis of just two elements is a bit risky, I would try to mitigate this assumption.

 

Line 561

"more detailed analyzes on a witness sample"

Is this a reference sample?

 

Lines 623-624

"taking considering the type"

Please check this sentence.

 

Lines 631-638

Delete irrelevant editorial information.

 

Lines 639-643

Check with the editorial office if the European project that co-financed the work should not be mentioned in the 'Funding' section.

 

Lines 644-651

Choose the sentence that describes your status with respect to conflicts of interest and delete all others.

 

Ref. 55

Please, correct "Columbini" in "Colombini".

Author Response

Thank you for your revision!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx