Abstract
Some pattern recognition methods have been used to characterize Korean ancient porcelainsherds using their elemental composition as analyzed by instrumental neutron activation analysis. A combination of analytical data by means of statistical linear discriminant analysis(SLDA) has resulted in removal of redundant variables, optimal linear combination of meaningful variables and formulation of classification rules. The plot in the first-to-second discriminant scores has shown that the three distinct territorial regions exist among porcelainsherds of Kyungki, Chunbuk-Chungnam, and Chunnam, with respective efficiencies of 20/30, 22/27 and 14/15. Similar regions have been found to exist among punchong porcelain and ceradonsherds of Kyungki, Chungnam and Chunbuk, with respective efficiencies of 7/9, 15/16 and 6/6. Classification has been further attempted by statistical isolinear multiple component analysis(SIMCA), using the sample set selected appropriately through SLDA as training set. For this purpose, all analytical data have been used. An agreement has generally been found between two methods, i.e., SLDA and SIMCA.