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Friendly fire: Engineering a fort wall in the Iron Age

Wadsworth, Fabian B.; Heap, Michael J.; Dingwell, Donald B.

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Authors

Michael J. Heap

Donald B. Dingwell



Abstract

There is widespread evidence that the walls of Iron Age forts across Europe were set on fire, causing partial melting of the stonework followed by either recrystallization or glass formation on cooling – a process termed “vitrification”. The motivation for fort wall firing has remained speculative since its first description in 1777. Since the suggestion of MacKie (1969) that fort vitrification might destabilize fort walls, the debate as to motives has focused on combative or destructive intentions. Here, a multidisciplinary analysis of experimental fort wall samples shows that in fact vitrification results in strengthening, not weakening. The strengthening involves diffusive and viscous sintering of material aggregates and size-dependent heat transfer. These new results support a long-since-dismissed idea that Iron Age fort walls were intentionally set ablaze in order to fortify the walls.

Citation

Wadsworth, F. B., Heap, M. J., & Dingwell, D. B. (2016). Friendly fire: Engineering a fort wall in the Iron Age. Journal of Archaeological Science, 67, 7-13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2016.01.011

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Jan 23, 2016
Online Publication Date Feb 13, 2016
Publication Date Mar 1, 2016
Deposit Date Mar 20, 2018
Publicly Available Date May 29, 2018
Journal Journal of Archaeological Science
Print ISSN 0305-4403
Publisher Elsevier
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 67
Pages 7-13
DOI https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2016.01.011

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