Provenance determination of archaeological remains is a valuable tool for reconstruction of past exchange networks. Among these materials, oyster shells are ubiquitous in sites from all prehistorical and historical periods. Thus, they seem to be promising candidates for provenance identification as they include chemical elements from the environment in their shells, which implies that an elemental fingerprint of the region of origin can be recorded in the shell composition. In this study, we present elemental measurements from 15 groups of modern and archaeological shells from 13 continental localities in mainland France and the island of Corsica (western Mediterranean Sea). Two of these localities had two oyster species (Crassostrea gigas and Ostrea edulis). Results indicate that (i) a species-specific elemental fingerprint exists and (ii) the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea provenances can be identified for O. edulis shells. Moreover, if the shell originated from a locality only partially connected to the ocean (e.g. an estuary or lagoon), a fingerprint specific to the watershed can also be observed, even between groups originating from the same bay. Using these measurements as reference fingerprints, we characterize the Mediterranean origin of two groups of shells unearthed at Lyons (central France, 200 km away from the nearest shoreline), dated from the 1st c. CE.

考古遗迹的出处确定是重建过去交流网络的宝贵工具。在这些材料中，牡蛎壳在所有史前和历史时期的遗址中无处不在。因此，它们似乎是鉴定来源的有希望的候选者，因为它们的壳中包含来自环境的化学元素，这意味着可以在壳成分中记录起源区域的元素指纹。在这项研究中，我们展示了来自法国大陆和科西嘉岛（地中海西部）13 个大陆地区的 15 组现代和考古贝壳的元素测量结果。其中两个地方有两种牡蛎（Crassostrea gigas和Ostrea edulis）。结果表明 (i) 存在物种特定的元素指纹，并且 (ii) 可以为O. edulis壳确定大西洋和地中海的来源。此外，如果贝壳起源于仅部分与海洋相连的地方（例如河口或泻湖），也可以观察到特定于流域的指纹，即使在来自同一海湾的群体之间也是如此。使用这些测量结果作为参考指纹，我们描述了在里昂（法国中部，距最近的海岸线 200 公里）出土的两组贝壳的地中海起源，这些贝壳的年代可追溯到公元 1 世纪。行政长官。