Prehistoric mines are often too large and too deep for conventional archaeological excavations. Non-destructive and minimally invasive methods of prospection can help to overcome these limits. Our case study of a Late Bronze Age opencast mine (ca. 1050 to 780 BC) shows the potential of geophysical prospection methods combined with core drillings. For the reconstruction of this mine, we combined electrical resistivity and induced polarization (IP) tomography, seismic refraction tomography (SRT) and ground penetrating radar (GPR). The geophysical data were collected based on an orthogonal grid of 10 longitudinal and transverse profiles, laid out over an area of ~330 × 300 m. The profiles allowed a three-dimensional interpolation of the geological units, the mining dumps, the mining areas and the residual mineralization. Additionally, two deep cores were drilled to ground-truth the geophysical prospection results. They provided information about the stratification at intersections of the measurement grid, and this proved crucial for validating the interpreted geophysical profiles. Each geophysical method applied provided different information for the reconstruction of the site: the electrical resistivity tomography offered the best clues as to the locations of the geological units and the dumps, the seismic refraction tomography visualized the transition between the dump or backfill layers and the underlying bedrock, and the IP measurements revealed residual mineralization. The georadar measurements, on the other hand, did not contribute to the interpretation owing to the limited depth of penetration. Based on the combination of borehole and geophysical data, it was possible to develop a hypothetical model of an open-pit mine for copper ore that developed in three phases (mines A–C) during the Late Bronze Age. Without the control provided by the core drillings, one of the mining areas (mine A) could not have been correctly identified in the geophysical prospections.

中文翻译：

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结合地球物理勘探和岩心钻探：东阿尔卑斯山普里格利茨-加斯泰伊青铜时代晚期铜矿的重建（奥地利）

对于常规考古发掘来说，史前矿山往往太大、太深。非破坏性和微创勘探方法可以帮助克服这些限制。我们对青铜时代晚期露天矿（约公元前 1050 年至 780 年）的案例研究显示了地球物理勘探方法与岩心钻探相结合的潜力。为了重建该矿井，我们结合了电阻率和激发极化 (IP) 断层扫描、地震折射断层扫描 (SRT) 和探地雷达 (GPR)。地球物理数据是基于 10 个纵向和横向剖面的正交网格收集的，分布在约 330 × 300 m 的区域内。剖面允许对地质单元、矿场、矿区和残余矿化进行三维插值。此外，还钻探了两个深层岩心，以验证地球物理勘探结果。他们提供了有关测量网格交叉点分层的信息，这对于验证解释的地球物理剖面至关重要。应用的每种地球物理方法为现场重建提供了不同的信息：电阻率断层扫描提供了有关地质单元和垃圾场位置的最佳线索，地震折射层析成像使垃圾场或回填层与底层之间的过渡可视化基岩，IP 测量显示残留矿化。另一方面，由于穿透深度有限，地理雷达测量对解释没有贡献。基于钻孔和地球物理数据的结合，可以开发一个铜矿露天矿的假设模型，该矿在青铜时代晚期分三个阶段（矿场 A-C）开发。如果没有岩芯钻探的控制，地球物理勘探就无法正确识别其中一个矿区（矿区 A）。