Space, the Iron Frontier: Production, Spatial Organization and Historicity of Iron Metallurgy within the Angkorian Khmer Empire, Cambodia (9th to 15th c. CE)
Author(s): Mitch Hendrickson; Stéphanie Leroy; Quan Hua; Kaseka Phon; Enrique Vega
Year: 2018
Summary
Iron production was a critical process in the expansion of the Angkorian Khmer Empire. Recent surveys by INDAP around the Phnom Dek region have revealed a massive industrial landscape that appears to have fueled Angkor’s expansionist ambitions between the 11th to 13th centuries. This paper presents a spatial and morphological GIS analysis of hundreds of slag concentrations mapped in this region to evaluate changes in the scale and organization of metal production. Combined with pXRF data of tap slags analyzed in the field, we model smelting recipes zones around Phnom Dek to reveal patterns of ore selection and producer practice. The results dovetail with the rigorous artifact-based analyses conducted by IRANGKOR with the overall goal of tracking how the Khmer iron economy functioned and impacted development of the most expansive state in mainland Southeast Asia.
Cite this Record
Space, the Iron Frontier: Production, Spatial Organization and Historicity of Iron Metallurgy within the Angkorian Khmer Empire, Cambodia (9th to 15th c. CE). Mitch Hendrickson, Stéphanie Leroy, Quan Hua, Kaseka Phon, Enrique Vega. Presented at The 82nd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Washington, DC. 2018 ( tDAR id: 444437)
This Resource is Part of the Following Collections
Keywords
General
Digital Archaeology: GIS
•
Landscape Archaeology
•
Metallurgy
Geographic Keywords
Asia: Southeast Asia
Spatial Coverage
min long: 92.549; min lat: -11.351 ; max long: 141.328; max lat: 27.372 ;
Record Identifiers
Abstract Id(s): 21103