Program > By author > Reich Guillaume

Use-wear analysis has been recently employed to disambiguate marks of damage on Celtic weapons of La Tène (Switzerland). Traces relating to combat use, i.e. produced incidentally in the course of fighting (at war, during battles), and traces resulting from intentional damage during religious rituals (a frequent phenomenon in the Gaulish context) can indeed be distinguished. These results have been obtained thanks to the combination of various disciplines that are very little or not usually used in Iron Age studies: experimental archaeology, forensic science, biomechanics, ethnoarchaeology, materials engineering, applied mathematics, anthropology, forensic medicine and battlefield archaeology. The formulation of this new field of study and the consideration of restoration techniques brings to light new evidence relating to the fighting techniques of the ancient Celts and provides a better understanding of Celtic warfare. The focus of this contribution will be on some results from these new studies.