Roman Mining and metal production near the antique city of ULPIANA (Kosovo)

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Since 2012, the Deutsches Bergbau-Museum Bochum and the Universität Frankfurt are carrying out a research project which is dedicated to Roman metal production in Kosovo. The investigations involve close cooperation with the Kosovar Ministry of Culture, Education and Sport and the Archaeological Institute of Kosovo. A collaboration contract specifying cooperation and joint publications has been signed 2014 and confirmed 2015. Since mining archaeology is a completely new territory for the Kosovarian colleagues, the cooperation has a significant impact, particularly for their own research which has been further increased by training of junior colleagues. The project focuses on mining and the related technical facilities for the processing and smelting of ore as well as for metal working. The study area concentrates on the mining district in the hinterland of the Roman municipium of Ulpiana, where a rich ore mineralisation with numerous traces of ancient workings is preserved. In the first phase of the project, research focused on the mining district between Shashkoc and Janjevo which has been worked extensively from Roman to high medieval times. The still clearly visible traces of mining activities have been systematically located, documented and sampled for their ore abundances. Geophysical examination methods enabled the detection of areas obviously suitable for further studies, namely settlement structures as well as facilities for ore beneficiation and metal production, which are probably related to the mining sites in the immediate vicinity. Excavations of selected sites have already been carried out and are intended to be continued. At the smelting site of Mramor, high temperature areas indicating a nearby furnace complex have already been partially uncovered and are planned to be completely excavated in the second part of the project. Further detailed investigations of the mining areas, but also of the smelting sites are envisaged to reach a final judgement of the montane region. The findings gathered during these targeted excavations offer the opportunity to systematically characterise the whole chaîne opératoire, i.e. from the mined ore to metal artefacts as the end products, with state of the art geoscientific methods, hence completing the results of the mining archaeological investigations. Lead isotope provenance studies of ores, smelting products and metal artefacts not only contribute to our knowledge about trade flows and commercial relationships in the Roman Empire but also extends the available but still not fully completed lead isotope reference database of ores with analyses from a region, which has so far been little noticed by international researchers, despite its enormous historic as well as current importance. The latter aspect certainly is of high importance for other archaeological projects dealing with metal provenance.