This spreadsheet updates and replaces this dataset.

This dataset summarizes the lead isotope ratios ²⁰⁸Pb/²⁰⁶Pb, ²⁰⁷Pb/²⁰⁶Pb, and ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb of 1,141 measurements from mineral and rock samples collected in over 550 different localities in eight countries around the Mediterranean basin: France, Greece, Italy (Sardinia), Morocco, Portugal, Spain, Tunisia and Turkey. The geologic ages of the ore-data range from ~500Ma – 1Ma, and have been extracted from publications that pre-date Thompson and Skaggs, 2013. The citations in column K reference our Citation Key for Ore-Dataset 1, v. 2.

Apart from providing a single-file source for lead isotope data from lead and silver ores in the Mediterranean region, Ore-Dataset 1, version 2 includes geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude in decimal degrees) for each sample site or referenced locality with a very high degree of accuracy that facilitates integration with research in diverse fields, including especially geology and archaeology. The identified sample locations are often within a few 10-100s meters of the mining site or collection point listed; the accuracy of the coordinates provided reflects the quality of geospatial information that appeared with the publication of each ore-sample, as well as our own knowledge and additional research.

This dataset is most fundamentally a disclosure of the underlying data used to research the ore-provenance of sampled Hacksilber artifacts in Thompson and Skaggs 2013¹. Along with our published method of calculation, Ore-Dataset 1 allows researchers to observe independently the qualities and ranges of data utilized in our study, their diagnostic limitations and capacities, and thus where research can and should advance. On present evidence, manifest insights include that the lead isotope compositions of critically significant ores from different localities do not have unique positions in three-dimensional space that amount to a ‘fingerprint’. Instead, this presentation of data underlying our 2013 study allows researchers to observe independently where the lead isotope ratios of sampled Hacksilber artifacts published in Thompson and Skaggs 2013 correlate with the ancient documents that understand the distant west as the locus of transient Phoenician metals-trade in the pre-colonial period (1200-800 B.C.), the island of Tarshish and the sources of Solomon's silver. Please note that entry 698, for a galena sample from Montinho, was collected in Portuguese region of Aljustrel, in the Iberian Pyrite Belt.

¹This dataset and its description assume knowledge of Thompson and Skaggs 2013, where first version of this dataset appeared. The latter remains available here as Ore-Dataset 1, version 1.