Statistical analysis of lead isotope data in provenance studies

This paper reports on tracing artifacts to ore sources which is different from assigning ore samples to time epochs. Until now, archaeometrists working with lead isotopes have used the ratio methods developed by geochronologists. For provenance studies, however, the use of composition data (the fraction of each of the four isotopes) leads to fewer arbitrary choices, two standard types of plots (labelled ternary and canonical variable, and a consistent method of discriminant analysis for separating groups of samples from different sources