Stevenson at Vulcano in the late 19th century

Abstract

This project seeks to recover and record the archaeological evidence associated with the extraction of sulfur (and perhaps other minerals as well) by James Stevenson, a Glasgow industrialist, from the volcanic island of Vulcano, Aeolian Islands, Italy, in the second half of the 19th century. This short preliminary report sets the scene by linking archival material with present conditions and by carrying out select mineralogical analyses of the type of the mineral resource Stevenson may have explored. New 3D digital recording tools (structure-from-Motion photogrammetry) have been introduced to aid future multidisciplinary research. This is a long-term project which aims to examine a 19th-century Scottish mining venture in a southern European context and its legacy on the communities involved. It also aims to view Stevenson’s activities in a diachronic framework, namely as an integral part of a tradition of minerals exploration in southern Italy from the Roman period or earlier.