Trace element studies of archaeological artifacts have become increasingly common due to technical and methodological developments over the last few decades. The ability to source archaeological artifacts can provide useful insights into trade and exchange patterns, mobility, and socio-economic relationships in the past. Despite being a key component in ancient toolkits and its widespread availability across many regions, chert has largely been overlooked in sourcing studies. While there are a handful of studies that have applied a variety of trace elemental analytical techniques, with varying success, only a few of these studies have sought to develop a robust and widely applicable methodology to the geochemical analysis of chert. This proposed project aims to develop a method using LA-ICP-MS for distinguishing between chert geological sources from a number of different formations across northern Belize.