Abstract:With the official excavation of the Fuquan Hill ruins in 2010, a large quantity of important archaeological ivory articles was found. Because of their long time of burial in earth,the organic components of the ivory have decomposed. In order to preserve these precious relics, the structure and composition of the excavated ivory were systemically studied using scanning electron microscopy, infrared spectroscopy,Xray diffraction and Xray fluorescence. The results showed that the ivory contains carbonate hydroxyl apatite with poor cyrstalline. Due to salt erosion arising from the long term underground, many pores formed inside the ivory, with diameter ranging from 0.33 μm to 3.6μm. The main elemental components of the ivory are Ca and P. There are also many other elements, which likely arose from the burial environment and have caused the ivory framework to weaken. An acetone solution of B72is a commonly used consolidant, but it has drawbacks, such as too rapid evaporation and easy formation of white films on the surface of the treated objects. In this work, we mixed different proportions of the less toxic ethanol with acetone to prepare a B72solution. This method seemed to be more effective by decreasing solvent evaporation time and inducing B72to permeate more deeply into the ivory. The physical properties of the formed films from solvents of different ratios were also measured. The results showed that the formed films have similar hardness, light transmittance and intensity. Two excavated ivory scepters and one ivory scepter handle were dehydrated and strengthened by B72acetone/ethanol (1/1v/v) and showed good consolidation result and a good appearance. In order to to better reinforce other unearthed ivory articles, we also tested a solution of B72mixed with polyvinyl butyral (PVE), which has a wide molecular weight distribution and can penetrate into small internal pores of the ivory. The formed film had no obvious difference in light transmittance and intensity but had obviously improved film flexibility.