ELEMENTAL STUDY OF POTTERY SHARDS FROM AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE IN DEDAN, SAUDI ARABIA, USING INDUCTIVELY COUPLED PLASMA-MASS SPECTROMETRY AND MULTIVARIATE STATISTICAL ANALYSIS

This study uses a chemical analytical approach for the characterisation of 36 ancient pottery shards from an archaeological site in Dedan, Saudi Arabia. Dedan (Al-Ula) was one of the main towns in the northwestern area of the Arabian Peninsula during the first millennium BCE and was located along the ancient spice route connecting Arabia with Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia. Inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and multivariate statistical analysis were used to identify 29 elemental properties in the pottery fragments and to separate the studied samples into groups. The study findings support the existence of four major groups: Abbasid, Nabataea, Tayma and Dedan. Principal component and cluster analyses validated the existence of these four groups. The ICP-MS results demonstrated that concentration measurements of elements, such as Ti, Mn, Ga, Sc, Cs and Rb, can be used to discriminate the four groups of ancient potteries. Keywords: Dedan, Pottery, ICP-MS, Multivariate statistical analysis