The discovery of ancient silver production at Bocche di Sciria (Montevecchio bacin, western Sardinia)

Lead slags, lead pieces and silver droplets, chronologically related to the Punic period (IV BC - III AC), have been found at Bocche di Sciria, in the Montevecchio mine basin (south-western Sardinia, Italy). From a pyrometallurgical point of view, the microchemical characterisation of these materials have shown that they can be associated to a smelting process for lead and silver production and we point out that Bocche di Sciria, to our best knowledge, is the first place of Italy where the silver production in a pre-Roman period is undoubtedly demonstrated. Furthermore, from an analytical point of view, lead isotope analysis results for lead ore, slags, litharge, lead pieces and silver indicate to rule out a lead isotope fractionation in ancient lead and silver production.