Chemical composition and deterioration of glass excavated in the 15th–16th century fishermen town of Raversijde (Belgium) B O. Schalm a, * , D. Caluwe ´ b , H. Wouters c , K. Janssens a , F. Verhaeghe b , M. Pieters c a Department of Chemistry, University of Antwerp, Universiteitsplein 1, B-2610 Antwerp, Belgium b Department of Archaeology, Free University of Brussels, Pleinlaan 1, B-1040 Brussels, Belgium c Institute for the Archaeological Heritage of the Flemish Community, Doornveld Industrie Asse 3, nr. 11, bus 30, B-1731 Zellik, Belgium Received 24 November 2003; accepted 10 May 2004 Available online 2 September 2004 Abstract The chemical composition, as determined by electron probe X-ray microanalysis of a series of ca. 100 archaeological glass fragments, excavated at the Raversijde site (Belgium) is discussed. In the 15th–16th century, Raversijde was a flourishing fishermen town located on the shore of the North Sea, close to the city of Ostend. As a consequence of several battles that were fought in its vicinity, the site was abandoned in the 16th century and was not occupied since then. It is one of the rare archaeological sites in Europe that contains a significant amount of information on the daily life inside a small but affluent medieval community. A comparison of the chemical composition of fragments of vessels and window glass encountered in Raversijde to those found in urban centres in Belgium and to literature date on German and French archaeological finds shows that glass made with wood ash dominates. Usually, it concerns artifacts with a predominantly utilitarian use. A few objects made with sodic (i.e., Na-rich) glass were also encountered, likely to have been imported from Venice during the 15th century or in later periods from an urban centre such as Antwerp, where Fac ¸on-de- Venice glass manufacturing activities were established near the start of the 16th century. D 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Historical glass; EPMA; Quantitative analysis; Glass composition 1. Introduction In the 15th–16th century, Raversijde was a flourishing fishermen town located on the shore of the North Sea in what is presently Belgium, close to the city of Ostend. The town had a population of at least several hundreds and was considerably larger than other villages in the area. On the other hand, Raversijde was appreciably smaller than the neighboring cities Ostend and Nieuwpoort. As a conse- quence of several battles that were fought in its vicinity, the site was abandoned in the 16th century and was not occupied since then: in the period 1482–1492 its neighbor- ing Flemish cities Brugge and Ghent were at war with Maximilian of Austria while in 1567 the Eighty Years’ war between Spain and the Netherlands erupted. The town finally disappeared after the siege of Ostend (1601–1604), during which the Spanish cavalry used it as an encampment. The remains of Raversijde are exceptionally well-preserved and provide a unique opportunity to reconstruct its socio- economic history by combining information present in historical documents with that which can be gathered from the artifacts excavated at the site. Thus, it is one of the rare archaeological sites in Europe that contains a significant amount of information on the daily life inside a small but affluent medieval community. In what follows, the analysis results of a set of ca. 100 glass fragments, excavated at the Raversijde site, are described and the relation between on the one hand the shape and use of the glass objects and on the other hand 0584-8547/$ - see front matter D 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.sab.2004.07.012 B This paper was presented at the International Congress on X-Ray Optics and Microanalysis (ICXOM XVII), held in Chamonix, Mont Blanc, France, 22–26 September 2003, and is published in the special issue of Spectrochimica Acta Part B, dedicated to that conference. * Corresponding author. Tel.: +32 3 820 23 73; fax: +32 3 820 23 76. E-mail address: koen.janssens@ua.ac.be (O. Schalm). Spectrochimica Acta Part B 59 (2004) 1647 – 1656 www.elsevier.com/locate/sab