Tin sources and trade during antiquity
Tin is an essential metal in the creation of tin-bronzes, and its acquisition was an important part of ancient cultures from the Bronze Age onward.
Known sources of tin in ancient times include the southeastern tin belt that runs from Yunnan in China to the Malay Peninsula; Cornwall and Devon in Britain; Brittany in France; the border between Germany and the Czech Republic; Spain; Portugal; Italy; and central and South Africa.
Tin extraction and use can be dated to the beginning of the Bronze Age around 3000 BC, during which copper objects formed from polymetallic ores had different physical properties.
Cassiterite often accumulates in alluvial channels as placer deposits due to the fact that it is harder, heavier, and more chemically resistant than the granite in which it typically forms.
[8] These deposits can be easily seen in river banks, because cassiterite is usually black or purple or otherwise dark, a feature exploited by early Bronze Age prospectors.
These problems are compounded by the difficulty in provenancing tin objects and ores to their geological deposits using isotopic or trace element analyses.
[24] Brittany – opposite Cornwall on the Celtic Sea – has significant sources of tin which show evidence of being extensively exploited after the Roman conquest of Gaul during the 50s BC and onwards.
[27] Western Asia has very little tin ore; the few sources that have recently been found are too insignificant to have played a major role during most of ancient history.
[30][28][31][32] In Northern Asia the only tin deposits considered exploitable by ancient peoples occur in the far eastern region of Siberia.
[34] Eastern Asia has a number of small cassiterite deposits along the Yellow River which were exploited by the earliest Chinese Bronze Age culture of Erlitou and the Shang dynasty (2500 to 1800 BC).
However, the richest deposits for the region, and indeed the world, lie in Southeastern Asia, stretching from Yunnan in China to the Malay Peninsula.
While rich veins of tin are known to exist in Central and South Africa, whether these were exploited during ancient times is still debated (Dayton 2003, p. 165).
Archaeologists have reconstructed parts of the extensive trade networks of ancient cultures from the Bronze Age to modern times using historical texts, archaeological excavations, and trace element and lead isotope analysis to determine the origins of tin objects around the world.
[10][30][31][28][8][32][42] Possibilities include minor now-depleted sources in the Near East, trade from Central Asia,[3] Sub-Saharan Africa,[30] Europe, or elsewhere.
[47] The early Roman world was mainly supplied with tin from its Iberian provinces of Gallaecia and Lusitania and to a lesser extent Tuscany.
By 2000 to 1500 BC Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan appear to have exploited their sources of tin, carrying the resources east and west along the Silk Road crossing Central Asia.
[49] It is unlikely that Southeast Asian tin from Indochina was widely traded around the world in ancient times as the area was only opened up to Indian, Muslim, and European traders around 800 AD.
[50] Indo–Roman trade relations are well known from historical texts such as Pliny's Natural History (book VI, 26), and tin is mentioned as one of the resources being exported from Rome to South Arabia, Somaliland, and India.
