proposed attribute, soil residue analysis potentially can be used 
to gain clearer or more complex additional data. 
Recent works on organic residues are very promising. 
Rottlander and Schlichterle (1979) have successfully used gas 
chromatography and thin layer chromatography to identify 
residues of plants and animals on a series of sites including an 
open air Aurignacian loess site some 34,000 years old. Pollack, 
Chang, and Cronin (1977) have reported on the determination of 
D and L isomers of some protein amino acids present in soils. 
It does appear that organic residue analysis offers promising 
possibilities in approaching the archaeological site. 
We are concerned with focusing on the examination of 
inorganic elemental components of site residues. Our preliminary 
findings suggest the potential of using elemental analysis to iden- 
tify vegetal remains. If we are to expand the data base to include 
inorganic components of residues, there are three major 
questions to be asked. 
1) What elements will be useful to examine? 
2) What is the significance of elemental concentrations? 
3) What type of strategy can be applied to implement this 
research? 
1) WHAT ELEMENTS SHOULD BE EXAMINED? 
Obviously, we would like to examine elements which have low 
mobility within the soil profile under a variety of conditions. The 
field of geochemistry has been concerned with the mobility of 
elements in biogeochemical prospecting. 
The mobility of elements determines their creation of a 
dispersion halo around an ore body. For our purposes, this 
information can be used to select suites of elements having low 
mobility. 
Andrew-Jones (1968) described the relative mobilities of 
elements in a low temperature and pressure environment. In 
Table One, we have listed the elements which have low mobility 
(barred) and those having very low mobility to being immobile 
(stippled). 
These elements should remain in the soil as residues under 
oxidizing and reducing conditions, and under acid, neutral to 
72 
