Brass weight used for measuring gold. The weight is square in shape and has geometrical and swirl designs on the upper surface.

Collection type: Object
Description: Brass weight used for measuring gold. The weight is square in shape and has geometrical and swirl designs on the upper surface.
Geographical reference: Ghana
Africa > Western Africa > Ghana; Ashanti Province
Cultural groups: Asante
Person: Field collector Bernard Schottlander; PRM source Sara Hicks
Date / Period: Date made: 1700-1900, uncertain
Date collected: By 2000
Acquisition information: Bequeathed: 2000
Materials and processes: Material Copper Alloy Metal, Material Brass Metal, Process Lost Wax Cast
Dimensions: Depth 9 mm, Width 25 mm, Length 25 mm
Object numbers: Accession number: 2000.6.142
Research and responses: This weight was one of 97 studied by Ryan Brown, an MSc student at Cranfield University, between 2015-2016. Ryan used HH-XRF analysis to determine that the gold weights matched the composition of contemporary Portuguese brasses thus corroborating the literature that identifies Portugal as the source of Akan copper alloys. He also found that across the five centuries of gold weight production their composition did not greatly vary and it is therefore difficult to infer any datable information. The title of his Master’s thesis was “Non-Destructive Compositional Analysis of Akan Copper-Alloy Goldweights from Ghana, in the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford: Characterisation and Provenance” and a copy can be found in RDF under 1938.18.

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