Asking different questions: highly radiogenic lead, mixing and recycling of metal and social status in the Chinese Bronze Age

Abstract The provenance of raw materials and finished objects is one of the most intriguing problems in archaeology. It is significant for the discussion of inter-regional cultural communication. Many of the methods used to determine provenance employed by archaeologists are shared with geologists or geochemists, among which the use of lead isotopes is probably one of the best-known. However, geologists and archaeologists do not always ask the same questions. Because of many and various human choices, it is not always possible to apply geological methods directly to archaeological objects. Specifically, the potential existence of mixing and recycling of metals challenges all the provenance studies of metal objects. In this paper, using Bronze Age China as an example, we suggest that by using geochemical techniques such as lead isotopic analysis and trace-element analysis of bronzes, but by asking slightly different questions, one can throw new light on the way in which important resources were managed by consumers of different social status within early dynastic China.