Gift for the gods or scrapping over scrap metal? Metallographic examination of sword fragments from the Late Bronze Age hoard from Slavonski Brod, Croatia

Abstract The deposition of metal in hoards appear throughout the European Bronze Age and there is on-going dispute about motivations behind the practice of hoarding metals at that period. Therefore, nine fragments of bronze swords from a late Bronze Age hoard have been investigated by metallography and X-ray fluorescence analysis (EDXRF) in order to evaluate their conditions. The objects do not show compositional deviations from contemporaneous material, but they are of poor quality showing considerable casting defects and pronounced dendritic segregation. They may never have been finished. Nonetheless, the reasons for their destruction and burial do not become evident.