X-ray Tomography Unveils the Construction Technique of Un-Montu's Egyptian Coffin (Early 26th Dynasty).

The Bologna Archaeological Museum, in cooperation with prestigious Italian universities, institutions, and independent scholars, recently began a vast investigation programme on a group of Egyptian coffins of Theban provenance dating to the first millennium BC, primarily the 25th-26th Dynasty ( 746-525 BC). Herein, we present the results of the multidisciplinary investigation carried out on one of these coffins before its restoration intervention: the anthropoid wooden coffin of Un-Montu (Inv. MCABo EG1960).

Microbial community analysis and biodeterioration of waterlogged archaeological wood from the Nanhai No. 1 shipwreck during storage.

Wooden shipwrecks are a significant part of the underwater cultural heritage. In 2007, the Nanhai No. 1 shipwreck was salvaged from the seabed and moved into the Marine Silk Road Museum, where it is still stored in a water tank.

Wooden tools and fire technology in the early Neanderthal site of Poggetti Vecchi (Italy).

Excavations for the construction of thermal pools at Poggetti Vecchi (Grosseto, Tuscany, central Italy) exposed a series of wooden tools in an open-air stratified site referable to late Middle Pleistocene. The wooden artifacts were uncovered, together with stone tools and fossil bones, largely belonging to the straight-tusked elephant The site is radiometrically dated to around 171,000 y B.P.

Quantitative evaluation by attenuated total reflectance infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy of the chemical composition of decayed wood preserved in waterlogged conditions.

This paper reports on the assessment of lignin and holocellulose by means of ATR-FTIR analysis and multivariate PLS regression. The analysis was conducted on 59 samples coming from different excavations where wood had been preserved in waterlogged conditions. A range of results from different wood species (Alnus sp.

A new method to quantitatively evaluate the chemical composition of waterlogged wood by means of attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared (ATR FT-IR) measurements carried out on wet material.

Wood degradation in waterlogged conditions, although slow, is relevant in some specific contexts, such as in the case of cultural heritage preservation (e.g., ancient shipwrecks found under the water table).

Unilateral NMR, 13C CPMAS NMR spectroscopy and micro-analytical techniques for studying the materials and state of conservation of an ancient Egyptian wooden sarcophagus.

A multi-technique approach was employed to study a decorated Egyptian wooden sarcophagus (XXV-XXVI dynasty, Third Intermediate Period), belonging to the Museo del Vicino Oriente of the Sapienza University of Rome. Portable non-invasive unilateral NMR was applied to evaluate the conservation state of the sarcophagus. Moreover, using unilateral NMR, a non-invasive analytical protocol was established to detect the presence of organic substances on the surface and/or embedded in the wooden matrix.

Argentinean native wood species: Physical and mechanical characterization of some Prosopis species and Acacia aroma (Leguminosae; Mimosoideae).

One of the problems in marketing the wood of Prosopis and Acacia is the lack of standardization of its qualities. The aim of this paper was to obtain a preliminary detection of some properties of the wood of four species of the genus Prosopis and one species from Acacia grown in Argentina. To accomplish this objective, the content of extractives and some physical and mechanical characteristics were analyzed.