Regional provenance of dolerite prehistoric objects through mineral analysis

Principal component analysis (PCA) was employed to interpret the dolerite geological provenance. These preliminary results show that statistical analysis permits to distinguish stone sample origins according to their REE profile at regional level and that Ti/Fe major element relation perhaps shows just coarse differences between samples collected on the extreme north and south of the studied region. The proposed method could be useful to discriminate the regional origin of lithic objects belonging to dolerite rocks and to interpret the primary material transport and exchange of lithic materials in Valencian Prehistory.