Petrography, geochemistry, and cathodoluminescence of ancient white marble from quarries in the southern Phrygia and northern Caria regions of Turkey: Considerations on provenance discrimination Mauro Brilli a , Francesca Giustini a , Aida Maria Conte b , Pilar Lapuente Mercadal c , Giovanni Quarta d , Hernando Royo Plumed e , Giuseppe Scardozzi d , Girolamo Belardi a a Istituto di Geologia Ambientale e Geoingegneria — CNR, 00015 Roma, Italy b Istituto di Geoscienze e Georisorse — CNR, c/o Dip. Sc. Terra Università Sapienza, 00185 Roma, Italy c Área de Petrología y Geoquímica, Departamento de Ciencias de la Tierra, Universidad de Zaragoza, 50009 Zaragoza, Spain d Istituto per i Beni Archeologici e Monumentali — CNR, 73100 Lecce, Italy e Unitat d'Estudis Arqueomètrics — UEA, Institut Català d'Arqueologia Clàssica, Tarragona, Spain abstract article info Article history: Received 25 March 2015 Received in revised form 10 August 2015 Accepted 22 August 2015 Available online xxxx Keywords: Petrography Geochemistry Stable isotopes Ancient marbles Marble quarries exploited in antiquity of the Denizli and Karacasu Basins (Turkey) were characterized by their petrography, carbon and oxygen isotopes, and cathodoluminescence. This study is an useful contribution for provenance studies of archeological artifacts composed of unknown marble. Marble quarries from the Hierapolis, Laodikeia, and Aphrodisias territories were considered; they constitute a homogeneous group of marble extraction districts. Collectively, they were among the most important sites for marble exploitation throughout antiquity from southwestern Anatolia, where only Afyon and Ephesus, which have already been studied extensively, were more important. In spite of that, the exportation of these marbles in ancient times has not yet been demonstrated. This is partially because their identification has never been fully addressed scientifically. Petrography, isotopes, and cathodoluminescence techniques used together are effective in discriminating among the study marbles. This could facilitate the determination of the provenance of these marbles in local monuments and artifacts. However, it could be difficult to determine the marble provenances in cases where a larger set of possible provenances should be taken into consideration. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Southwestern Anatolia can be described in terms of landforms as a network of valleys, differently oriented around the Büyük Menderes Graben. The Büyük Menderes Graben is an elongated, depressed struc- ture extending across the east and west. It hosts the longest river in the region, the Menderes River (the ancient Meander) (Fig. 1). The in- terweaving of the valleys results from the development of systems of horsts and grabens, elongated blocks on the Earth's crust that have been raised and lowered, respectively, relative to their surrounding areas as a direct effect of faulting; they were generated by a crustal stretching that occurred around the early Miocene (15 million years ago). This extensional phase is one of the most recent episodes of a tormented and complex geological history that has led to exhumation and disarticulation of an enormous body of ancient rocks, called the Menderes Massif. This massive rock body is a complicated sequence of inhomogeneous metamorphosed rocks, including gneisses, schists, and marbles. In particular, the southern portion of the Menderes massif crops out for hundreds of km as a large arched belt of schists and marbles, frequently interrupted by the valley incisions, from Bafa Lake (southeast of Ephesos), up to Denizli, and beyond (Fig. 1). These marbles constituted an endless source of materials for the monument-building of the many cities that thrived here in antiquity, from Hellenistic to Byzantine times. In this area, ancient vestiges of mar- ble quarrying are everywhere, though most are small in size. Probably many ancient quarries are still uncovered or have disappeared because of the obliteration of modern quarrying activities. This paper focuses on the marble exploited in antiquity around two of the basins situated just south of the Büyük Menderes Graben, where important ancient cities thrived in Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantines times: the ancient Aphrodisias, located roughly in the middle of the Basin of Karacasu, crossed by the Dandalas River (the ancient Morsynus River), and Laodikeia and Hierapolis, situated along the valley of Çürüksu River (the ancient Lykos River), or the Basin of Denizli, as it is now known. In these centers marble has been the material par excellence for monument-building and urban decoration. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 4 (2015) 124–142 E-mail addresses: mauro.brilli@cnr.it (M. Brilli), francesca.giustini@igag.cnr.it (F. Giustini), aidamaria.conte@uniroma1.it (A.M. Conte), plapuent@unizar.es (P. Lapuente Mercadal), g.quarta@ibam.cnr.it (G. Quarta), hroyo@icac.cat (H. Royo Plumed), g.scardozzi@ibam.cnr.it (G. Scardozzi), girolamo.belardi@igag.cnr.it (G. Belardi). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2015.08.036 2352-409X/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports journal homepage: http://ees.elsevier.com/jasrep