Experimental Study of Bronze Casting Molds for Reproduction of the Ancient Chinese Bronze

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Craft and Technology: Knowledge of the Ancient Chinese Artisans" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

To understand ancient casting technology in China, the non-destructive SEM-EDS technique was applied to casting molds from Anyang. Their grain sizes were various but some of the molds showed a layered structure with fine decorations. The finest layers composed of very fine mineral particles which is comparable to the loess from Anyang area. It indicates that the grain sizes were intentionally controlled. Simultaneously, a series of manufacturing experiments with artificial fine mineral particles (named as Granite Powders) were conducted for reproduction of bronze casting molds. The particles were sieved and elutriated from silicate sands, and the size of the particles was sorted similarly to those found in the Yinxu molds. Those powders enable shaping and carving of the mold and transfer of decoration from model. From surface observations of the unearthed molds from Xiaotun site of Yinxu, a possible bonding technique between the molds is recognized. This should be a fundamental issue for restoring the Yinxu Bonzes technology which applied a composite mold technology to produce characteristic three-dimensional shapes. Further experiments attempted for bonding materials with the granite powders.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)   •
• Craft and Technology: Knowledge of the Ancient Chinese Artisans

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25280