On the provenance of stonepaste bodies of tiles from Takht-e Soleyman, northwestern Iran

Petrofabrics and compositional data from thirty-three stonepaste bodies of 13th-14th century architectural tiles retrieved at Takht-e Soleyman (northwestern Iran) were compared with those of fifty-four stonepaste bodies from Kashan, Isfahan, Rayy, Soltaniyeh and Yazd, in order to shed light on the provenance of the tiles from Takht-e Soleyman. The petrofabrics showed two main groups of stonepaste bodies within the shards from Takht-e Soleyman with the largest group most certainly originating from Kashan. Compositional data acquired by scanning electron microscopy - energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry (SEM-EDS) and energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence (EDXRF) confirmed the grouping suggested by the petrofabric analysis and also showed that the stonepaste bodies from Kashan comprise two groups. We argue that two distinct types of stonepaste bodies have been produced in Kashan and were exported to other areas during the 13th and early 14th century. In addition, SEMEDS and micro-Raman spectroscopy (& micro;-Raman) microanalyses revealed inclusions indicating a possible limited local production of tiles at Takht-e Soleyman.