Our current research project: Lombardic-Danish Interactions
The project which is supported by the A.P: Møller Foundation and the Augustinus Foundation enlightens the possible connection between Danish and North Italian redbrick architecture in the 12th Century AD.
Our research brings a 100-year-old hypothesis to the test, namely that the introduction of brick architecture in Early Medieval Denmark in the 12th century was instigated by a connection between Lombardy in Northern Italy and Denmark. This supposed connection which was argued based on art history and architectural analysis at the beginning of the 20th century seemingly took its course directly from Italy to Denmark. Personal links, however vague, have been seen behind it and it probably had to involve the transfer of both people and technology.
We will obtain new data based on archaeometric measurement applied to churches located in Denmark, Sorø Klosterkirke and Ringsted Skt. Bendts, and two churches at Lodi and Chiaravalle in the Lombardy area in Northern Italy. The data together with classical building archaeological observations, will reveal if identical technologies were used in both areas. The techniques encompass:
- manufacturing date of the bricks by thermoluminescence dating
- provenancing the clay sources of the bricks, by thermoluminescence, magnetic susceptibility, X-ray fluorescence and X-ray diffraction
- sorting of the bricks at the building site by in-situ colour measurements and thin-section petrography
- maximum firing temperature of the bricks by magnetic susceptibility and spectrophotometry
- identifying the characteristics of the mortar used for building the churches by thin-section petrography and X-ray diffraction, compared to mortars used for erection of other kinds of stone churches
- re-estimation of similarities in architectural details combined with the above-mentioned parameters.
The project is a collaboration between the National Museum of Denmark, Bertelsen & Scheving Arkitekter, Pisa University, and ISPC-CNR (Istituto di Scienze del Patrimonio Culturale, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche) in Sesto Fiorentino.
Our previous major collaborative projects
- Bones4Culture
- OPHELIA
- TheCityDwellers
Guest researchers
- Margaret MacConnachie (2022, Queens University, Canada)
- Marie-Line Torrijos (2022, University of Toulouse, France)
- Thomas Delbey (2019-20, post.doc. at SDU)
- Donata Magrini (2016, CNR-IVCBC, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy, ICP-MS, XRF)
- Raphaëlle Bruneau (2016, University of Versailles, France, ICP-MS, CV-AAS)
- Thomas Delbey (2014-16, Paris X Nanterre, France, TL, Magnetic susceptibility, XRF, XRD)
- Alison Shepherd (2014, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland, ICP-MS, CV-AAS)
- Agathe Hurel (2014, University of Verseille, France, ICP-MS, CV-AAS)
- Paolo d'Imporzano (2013-14, Pisa University, Italy, ICP-MS, CV-AAS)