The Bronze age amber industry in northern Italy in light of high-resolution 3D imaging

We summarize here the preliminary results of the experimental application of high-resolution 3D imaging to the study and reconstruction of the chaîne opératoire of amber bead-making in the northern Italian peninsula in the 2nd millennium BC. Amber, an unusually soft raw material that is highly sensible to any kind of physical and chemical change, records a spectrum of archaeological information that was almost unimaginable until recently. We show how the examination of manufacturing waste and finished beads using opto-digital microscope and laser scanning confocal microscope (LSCM), and considering the interactions with post-manufacturing use-wear traces, reveals unexpected evidence about the beads’ biography, emphasizing, in first place, the probable important role of the heat-treatment of amber with metal tools.