Preservation, Degradation, and Contamination: The Chemical Identification of Cochineal in Archaeological Environments

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Although cochineal has played an important role in Mesoamerican societies, a lack of suitable methods has hampered its investigation by archaeologists. Luckily, recent developments in organic residue analysis suggest the possibility that cochineal production may be identified in the archaeological record through identification of carminic acid, its primary source of color. Prior to its application to archaeological materials, however, experimental archaeology must be conducted to build comparative data sets and establish the efficacy of methodological protocols.

Experimental production of cochineal products was done to test the hypothesis that carminic acid residues form and preserve in inorganic matrices buried in archaeological environments. The ceramic and ground stone tools were analyzed chemically (HPLC with MS, DAD-MS, and/or MS-MS) before and after burial underground for one year. Although carminic acid concentrations did decrease modestly, most tools maintained measurable quantities of the water-soluble biomarker. In several samples, a distinctive spectral pattern indicative of carminic acid’s degradation, though crucially not beyond recognition, was identified. Furthermore, this analysis validated the use of tools’ inactive surfaces as controls for environmental and laboratory contamination. This poster concludes by reporting preliminary results from similar chemical analysis conducted on hypothesized cochineal production tools from Late Postclassic-Early Colonial Tlaxcala.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39792.0