Hunting a phantom quarry "four miles from Metz": Transboundary trade of Lorraine alabaster in the 16th century - BRGM - Bureau de recherches géologiques et minières Accéder directement au contenu
Communication Dans Un Congrès Année : 2024

Hunting a phantom quarry "four miles from Metz": Transboundary trade of Lorraine alabaster in the 16th century

Résumé

Towards the end of the 16th century, the first known hints emerge that the Lorraine region, and in particular the archbishopric of Metz, was a source of alabaster for sculpture in the principalities and bishoprics of the western part of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1587, a list of available alabaster deposits to be used for the epitaph of Magdalena zur Lippe commissioned by the Landgrave Georg I of Hessen-Darmstadt, mentions an alabaster quarry “in the land of Lorraine, four miles from Metz” exported as far as to Würzburg in present-day Northern Bavaria. Ten years later, Metz alabaster was ordered for the decoration of the Schnellenberg castle in Westphalia. Using geochemical fingerprinting, we found evidence that a common source of alabaster was used in the Metz region and further downstream, in the Mosel and Rhine valleys. Indeed, Alabaster was used broadly from the late 16th century onwards in the major episcopal towns Trier, Bonn and Cologne. We postulate that this “phantom quarry”, so far not identified in our isotopic database of historical European alabaster deposits, is identical with the one mentioned near Metz. Indeed, several alabaster-grade gypsum quarries, still mentioned in 19th century literature, could be found within a range of around 30 km around the town. We will present results of combined archival, geological and geochemical research, conducted in the framework of the Franco-German Materi-A-Net project (https://materi-a-net.uni-koeln.de/en/news/) co-funded by ANR and DFG within the FRAL program.
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Dates et versions

hal-04535386 , version 1 (06-04-2024)

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Wolfram Kloppmann, Arthur Acker, Lise Leroux, Aleksandra Lipińska. Hunting a phantom quarry "four miles from Metz": Transboundary trade of Lorraine alabaster in the 16th century. EGU General Assembly 2024, EGU, Apr 2024, Wien, Austria. ⟨10.5194/egusphere-egu24-15151⟩. ⟨hal-04535386⟩
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