Neutron Activation Analysis of Ad 1660–1930 European Copper‐coloured Blue Glass Trade Beads From Ontario, Canada

Blue glass trade beads from well‐dated late seventeenth‐ to early twentieth‐century sites and collections have been analysed non‐destructively by instrumental neutron activation analysis. The beads display enough variations in their elemental contents to allow us to characterize the different chemistries. The implication of these results is that similar chemical analyses of blue beads from undated archaeological sites may be used to help date the sites, since each bead chemistry has a specific earliest period.