Draft:Michael Cowell
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Michael R. (Mike) Cowell is a metallurgist and archaeological scientist, who worked for over 30 years in the Department of Scientific Research at the British Museum, publishing on archaeometallurgy, ancient coinage, X-ray fluorescence (XRF), trace-element analysis, conservation science, and analytical methods applied to archaeological materials.
"From the mid-1980s through the late-1990s the British Museum Research Laboratory, with [Paul] Craddock,[1] Ian Freestone,[2] Mike Tite,[3] Duncan Hook, Susan La Niece and Mike Cowell on staff, was the world leader in the study of ancient technology." [4]
Selected Publications
[edit]Cowell’s work is often collaborative, focussing on objects in the British Museum and other collections. He has an extensive range of publications in journals (including Archaeometry, Historical Metallurgy, British Numismatic Journal, Numismatic Chronicle), excavation reports, conference proceedings and scientific appendices to catalogues.
Books and edited volumes
- 1991 - Neutron Activation and Plasma Emission Spectrometric Analysis in Archaeology: Techniques and Applications. British Museum Occasional Paper 82. London: British Museum Press. ISBN 978-0861590827 (with M.J. Hughes and D.R. Hook)
- 1993 - Metallurgy in Numismatics, vol. 3 (Royal Numismatic Society, Special Publication 23) ISBN 978-0901405296 (with M.M. Archibald)
- 1994 - Lead Cloth Seals and Related Items in the British Museum. British Museum Occasional Paper 93. London: British Museum. ISBN 978-0861590933 (with G. Egan and H. Granger-Taylor)
- 1998 - Metallurgy in Numismatics, vol. 4 ((Royal Numismatic Society, Special Publication 30, 1998). ISBN 978-0901405296 (with Andrew Oddy)
- 2005 – Metallurgical Analysis of Chinese Coins at the British Museum (British Museum Research Publication. ISBN 978-0861591526 (with H. Wang, J. Cribb, S. Bowman, M. Wayman and Y. Shashoua)
Articles, chapters and appendices
- 1976 - "Atomic absorption techniques in archaeology", Archaeometry 18(1): 19–37. (with M.J. Hughes and P.T. Craddock)
- 1977 - "Prehistoric flint mines and their identification as sources of raw material", Archaeometry 14: 151–176.
- 1977 - "Energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence analysis of ancient gold alloys." PACT 1, 76–85.
- 1983 - "The trace element composition of polished flint axes as an indicator of source". Archaeometry 25: 135–163. (with P.T. Craddock, M.N. Leese and M.J. Hughes)
- 1987 - "Celtic coinage in Britain: new hoards and recent analyses." British Numismatic Journal 57: 1–23. (with W.A. Oddy and A.M. Burnett)
- 1990 - "Scientific report" in R. Jackson, Camerton: The Late Iron Age and Early Roman Metalwork (London: British Museum Publications). ISBN 978-071411395
- 1991 - Neutron Activation and Plasma Emission Spectrometric Analysis in Archaeology. British Museum Occasional Paper 82. (with M.J. Hughes and D.R. Hook)
- 2000 - "Scientific analysis of the Lydian precious metal coinages" in A. Ramage and P. Craddock (eds) King Croesus' Gold: Excavations at Sardis and the History of Gold Refining (London: British Museum Press) ISBN 978-0714108889
- 2001 - "Searching for the provenance of gold: the methodology of gold analysis by ICP-MS". Proceedings of Archaeometry 2000. (with A. Gondonneau and M.F. Guerra)
- 2020 - "A Component of cliché type coin forgery manufacture?" The Crucible (Historical Metallurgy Society Newsletter), no. 18.
- 2023 - "The assay and refining of gold in the post-medieval Islamic world: Potential and reality", Historical Metallurgy, 54(1): 9-20. (with P.T. Craddock and M.F. Guerra)
- 2026 - Cowell, M, Craddock, P. and Guerra, M. "The composition of the Salcombe gold and a contemporary Moroccan treatise on the assay and refining of gold: reality and theory compared", in V. Porter and D. Parham (eds), From Morocco to the Coast of England: The Story of the Dom van Keulen and its Remarkable Cargo (British Museum Research Publication 238), pp. 146-159. ISBN 978-0-861592388 (with P. Craddock and M. Guerra) Open Access
References
[edit]- ^ Paul Craddock, British Museum Collection Online, https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG67824 Accessed 3 July 2026.
- ^ Ian Freestone, UCL staff profile, https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/2886-ian-freestone Accessed 3 July 2026
- ^ Mike Tite, School of Archaeology, University of Oxford staff profile https://www.arch.ox.ac.uk/people/professor-mike-tite Accessed 3 July 2026
- ^ David Killick, Book Review: Metals and Mines: Studies in Archeometallurgy, Journal of Archaeological Science 35 (2008) pp.3044-3046. Accessed 3 July 2026.