The coppersmiths of Nuremberg during the 15th-18th century. Archaeological and archaeometallurgical aspects of their skilled manual work

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Ingolf Ericsson
• Subject Area: Prehistory and World Archaeology ; Early Modern History
• Term: from 2017 to 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 345199384

During the late middle ages and early modern times the Imperial City of Nuremberg was one of the most important trading centers in the Holy Roman Empire. Next to draperies the metal products, the so-called >>Nürnberger Ware<<, were the most common and most important trading good of the imperial city. These metal products had a wide range from suits of armour, fire arms and melee weapons to chandeliers, thimbles, needles and many more, also semi-finished products like wires and metal sheets. The production of brass goods had a special status, because they were accompanied by technological innovations (for example the development of new copper based alloys), which made a substantial mass production possible. Yet the distribution as well as the formal and technological development of these products never was systematically explored despite their overwhelming significance for the late medieval and early modern metal-good-production of Nuremberg. Non-ferrous metal products of Nuremberg were examined especially by art historians and collectors from museums. On the part of the historic research there are just a few studies, which do not base upon archive studies.It is the main purpose to achieve an extensive reconstruction of the production processes and the organization of the late medieval and early modern non-ferrous metal workshops of Nuremberg. This shall be reached by recording the workshop areas and the melting furnaces as well as the production residues and garbage, blanks and other artifacts, which were found within the workshop grounds in the old town of Nuremberg. In combination with the written documents and the visual sources, the still existing knowledge gap of the production and distribution of Nuremberg's non-ferrous metal goods shall be closed. Therefore it is necessary to combine archaeological, historical and natural scientific projections of research in an interdisciplinary manner.Next to researching the interior of the workshops (particularly furnaces) it is a rare possibility to gain basic insights in the field of historical technical ceramics. For the german-speaking region there are barely precise studies of this material. Archaeometallurgical analysis of the non-ferrous relics shall provide data, which may prove the mentioned innovations directly on basis of the archaeological material. Furthermore the data serve to implement a database, which can be used for further research on the export of Nuremberg metal-goods. In cooperation with the municipal department for archaeology the collected results shall be presented eventually in a small exhibition for the general public.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants