XRF doesn't seem "primitive" to me. The equipment costs $17,000. 0% of numismatic catalogs include elemental analysis as of 2021. I walked down 47th street with a fistful of dollars and no one would analyze coins for me. I agree Thermal Ionization Mass Spectrometry, which would get isotopes, would be interesting. I know David Hendin of the ANS has done work on the istopes of Judean coins. Do you know anyone who offers isotopic analysis of coins as a service? I have seen a few scattered papers on archeometallurgy coming out of universities that have both a physics department and archaeology department. What would impress me is a catalog of a small university coin collection with even elemental analysis of the entire corpus. Isotopic info would be a bonus.
1. Given that this thread has turned towards metal testing, I thought it might be helpful if I shared my experience with respect to having one of my coins (an incuse Caulonia stater) tested using XRF and an electron microscope. 2. I made my enquiries among small testing labs supporting the mining industry. In no time I found a smaller lab with equipment and an engineer who had decades of metallurgical experience. 3. Photos and details can be found at https://www.lamoneta.it/topic/193128-placcato-incuse-nomos-di-caulonia/ D
https://www.gmx.net/magazine/panora...logramm-schweren-silberschatz-roemer-36268914 these coins are real and they are a million percent.