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Ceramics

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Experimenting with the Ancient Greek Pottery Production Process from Clay Selection to Firing in a (Re)constructed Updraft Kiln

Author(s)
Francesca Tomei 1 ✉,
Juan Ignacio Jimenez Rivero 2
Publication Date

Introduction

This experimental project aimed to reproduce the Hellenistic (fourth-third century BC) Greek pottery production process. The project was conducted by the authors, Francesca Tomei, PhD graduate in Archaeology at the University of Liverpool, and Juan Ignacio Jimenez Rivero, a ceramist specializing in replicating ancient pottery technology, who frequently collaborates with the Department of Classics, Ancient History, Archaeology and Egyptology, University of Manchester, on ceramic experimental archaeology projects and activities.

Pottery at the Scottish Crannog Centre

Author(s)
Rachel Backshall 1
Publication Date
The Scottish Crannog Centre, an open-air museum on Loch Tay in Highland Perthshire, has been able to do some really meaningful, powerful work over the past 12 months focusing on the power of prehistoric pottery! Supported by the Esmee Fairbairn Collections Fund and the Headley Trustand Art Fund, the project has led to new relationships, a new strategic partner for the organisation and ...

Different Vessel Surface Polishing Methods and Mutual Effects of their Applications

Author(s)
Joanna Dymańska 1,
Aleksandra Cetwińska 1 ✉,
Dariusz Manasterski 1
Publication Date
The discovery of an excavated cup with a glossy surface prompted reflection on the polishing of vessel surfaces and their mutual significance. We present the results of the application of three different polishing methods along with a reflection on their function and on the skills and ability of the potter...

Scored Basins from Late Minoan Crete: an Experimental Interpretation from Construction to Functionality

Author(s)
Brianna Jenkins 1
Publication Date
During the Bronze Age in Crete, agriculture, pottery production, metallurgy, textiles, architectural feats, trade, and other specializations flourished. Throughout habitation on Crete, pottery production was an area of craftsmanship and practicality from the end of the Neolithic to Mycenean and Iron Age. This experiment, however, relates to the Late Minoan I period in the geographical region of Mochlos...

An Experimental Approach to Assessing the Tempering and Firing of Local Pottery Production in Nubia during the New Kingdom Period

Author(s)
Julia Budka 1 ✉,
Giulia D’Ercole 1
Publication Date

Introduction

Ceramologists usually apply the term style to describe the set of visual (i.e., decorative and morphometric) attributes of a ceramic object (see, e.g., Rice, 2015, pp. 388-410). The term fabric is mainly employed in petrographic and technological studies to indicate the physical characteristics of the material (i.e., clay paste composition) a pot is made from ( Nordström and Bourriau, 1993, p. 162).

Assessing Forming Techniques of Athenian Ceramic Alabastra

Author(s)
Isabelle Algrain 1
Publication Date

Introduction

Studies related to the craft of the potter whether it is the examination of manufacturing techniques of ancient Greek vases or clay analyses, have considerably developed over the last decades. Yet, experimental reconstructions and potter-centred analyses have mostly focused on Bronze Age pottery, Early Iron Age pottery, coarse wares, or kitchen wares (Knappett, 1999; Müller, Kilikoglou and Day, 2015; Choleva, 2020; Choleva, Jung and Kardamaki, 2020).

Some Reflections on the Origin and Use of the Potter's Wheel during the Iron Age in the Iberian Peninsula. Interpretive Possibilities and Limitations

Author(s)
Juan Jesús Padilla Fernández
Publication Date
An abundance of past research has addressed Iron Age pottery in the Iberian Peninsula since the beginning of archaeological analysis in Spain. However, it has mainly focused on examining historical-cultural aspects linked to specific chronologies and typologies. It is only rarely that studies have been concerned with production processes. Ethnography has traditionally been used to make direct ...

Identifying Ceramic Shaping Techniques: Experimental Results Using the Inclusion and Void Orientation Method

Author(s)
Jon Ross 1 ✉,
Kent Fowler 2
Publication Date
This contribution presents the results of experiments using a simple but effective inclusion and void orientation method for identifying shaping techniques on cut and scanned vessels and sherds. Not only does it provide an additional line of complementary evidence for differentiating ceramic chaînes opératoires, but we argue that it offers observations not accessible by other imaging methods and scales of analysis...

Throwing Punic Amphorae: An Archaeological and Experimental Approach to the use of the Potter's Wheel in southern Iberia during the Iron Age

Author(s)
Antoni M. Sáez Romero 1 ✉,
Ricardo Belizón Aragón 1,
Pedro A. Albuquerque 1
Publication Date
The transport of food products in amphorae was a basic pillar for the maritime-oriented economies and sustenance supplies of the Phoenician and Punic communities of first millennium BC southern Iberia. Over the last few decades, numerous investigations have been carried out aimed at identifying the manufacturing sites of these amphorae, at defining both their typological and chronological aspects...

Crafting Beyond Habitual Practices: Assessing the Production of a House Urn from Iron Age Central Italy

Author(s)
Caroline Jeffra 1
Publication Date
A house-shaped urn dating to the Early Iron Age from Central Italy was technologically assessed in order to establish the forming techniques necessary to produce it. This hypothesized forming sequence was then tested through the production of two experimental urns. It was found that there is a meaningful relationship between the clay texture choices, the forming techniques, and the overall morphology of the finished object...

The Development of the 1st Cultural Exchange of Traditional Knowledge and Experimental Practices of the Peruaçu River Basin

Author(s)
Ana Carolina Brugnera 1 ✉,
Lucas Bernalli Fernandes Rocha 1
Publication Date

Introduction

The Peruaçu National Park is a nature conservation unit located in the environs of the Peruaçu River basin, in the North of the State of Minas Gerais, and it preserves an area for the Cerrado biome of Brazil. The Cerrado is an area of 2 million square kilometres and is the second largest biome covering the Brazilian territory. However, just 20% of it is preserved. The region of the Peruaçu National Park belongs to this preserved 20%. On it is one of the most important archaeological sites of rock paintings in the state of Minas Gerais.

Ceramicists, Apprentices or Part-Timers? On the Modelling and Assembling of Peak Sanctuary Figurines

Author(s)
Céline Murphy 1
Publication Date

Who Modelled and Assembled Peak Sanctuary Figurines?

In this paper, I explore the pervasive, yet only partially investigated, question of who made peak sanctuary figurines. Peak sanctuary figurines are small anthropomorphic and zoomorphic clay representations, found by the thousands at Cretan Bronze Age mountain sites, alongside a range of utilitarian ceramic vessels and, occasionally, ceramic votive body parts and models, metal objects, stone vessels and small pebble clusters.

Fine Pottery Chaîne Opératoire from the Bronze Age site of Via Ordiere, Solarolo (RA, IT): Experiments on the Relationship between Surface Treatments and Function

Author(s)
Andrea La Torre 1 ✉,
G. Mannino 1,
A. Zurzolo 1
Publication Date
11th EAC Trento 2019
***The aim of this experimental work was to catch a glimpse of the pottery chaîne opératoire, particularly linked to the surfaces treatments applied, in order to better understand what type of traces they could leave on pots and how they could differently affect the use of final products...

Experimental Study of Byzantine Chafing Dishes

Author(s)
Georgia Vakasira 1
Publication Date

Introduction

Byzantine chafing dishes constitute one of the least studied utensils of the Byzantine household. Though a series of publications discuss them in a more detailed manner (Morgan, 1942; Bakirtzis, 1989; Sanders, 1995; François, 2010; Poulou-Papadimitriou, 2008; Vassiliou, 2016), most of our knowledge about chafing dishes derives from their fleeting mention in excavation reports, where they are listed among other finds and only briefly described.

Experimental Bonfirings of Pottery with Camel Dung Fuel, Jordan, July 2018

Author(s)
Maria-Louise Sidoroff 1
Publication Date
The objective of this series of experimental pottery firings with camel dung fuel was to isolate the function of this fuel type within the context of a simple mode of pottery firing for data applicable to studies of ancient pottery manufacture...

CRAFTER: An Experimental Approach to Fire-Induced Alteration of Pottery Fabrics

Author(s)
Carlos Velasco Felipe 1,2 ✉,
José María Bellón 1,2,
Bartolomé Bellón 1,2
Publication Date
In doing an inventory of ceramic materials from archaeological excavations, it is a common practice to indicate their observable atmosphere of firing. This parameter refers to the presence of gases, especially oxygen, during the firing and cooling of pottery: if oxygen circulates freely, the procedure is said to be oxidising; if, on the contrary, the atmosphere of firing lacks free air, it is called reducing...

CRAFTER: Re-creating Vatin Pottery 2: an Examination of Clay Quality and its Behaviour

Author(s)
Vesna Vučković 1,2
Dejan Jovanović 3
Publication Date

The Bronze Age Vatin culture has been known in archaeology as a cultural phenomenon distinguished by a specific material culture which existed between c. 2200 to 1600 B.C. in the region of the southern part of the Pannonian Plain, and the area along the lower Sava river and south of the Danube river. The Vatin culture followed on from the Early Bronze Age cultures in the region, indicating stabilization in this area after the disintegration of the Aeneolithic Vučedol culture by tribes from the Russian steppe (Garašanin 1979, p. 504; cf.

CRAFTER: Potting Techniques of the Bronze Age

Author(s)
Caroline Jeffra 1
Publication Date
Throughout its history, experimental archaeology has fulfilled a valuable role in archaeological research, allowing craftspeople and scholars alike to deepen an understanding of people and their societies in the past. EXARC’s recent involvement in the CRAFTER project, and the author’s participation in its International Meeting in Mula (Spain), has demonstrated that significant knowledge gaps remain in...

Event Review: The Second Annual Vounous Terracotta Symposium

Author(s)
E. Giovanna Fregni 1
Publication Date
Rauf Ersenal has hiked through the mountains of North Cyprus for years, searching for the rare clays that have been used to make pottery there for millennia. The most prized colours of these clays produce a soft green that is the colour of fresh olives, the bright red of terra sigiliata, and another clay that creates a true black...

CRAFTER: Re-creating Vatin Pottery

Author(s)
Vesna Vučković 1,2 ✉,
Dejan Jovanović 3
Publication Date
An attempt to re-create pottery of the Vatin culture has been made within the Crafter project (Crafting Europe in the Bronze Age and Today), whose aim is to help revive modern-day artisanship by drawing inspiration from Bronze Age pottery of four European Bronze Age societies: El Argar (Spain), Únětice (Central Europe), Füzesabony (eastern Hungary) and Vatin (Serbia)...

CRAFTER: Reviving Bronze Age Pottery in EU-funded Project

Author(s)
Carlos Velasco 1
Miguel Valério 1
Publication Date
The CRAFTER project aims at reviving modern-day artisanship by drawing inspiration from pottery traditions of four of the most remarkable Bronze Age societies of Europe: El Argar (south-eastern Spain), Únětice (Central Europe), Füzesabony (eastern Hungary) and Vatin (south Serbia)...

Some Remarks on Technological Process of Tartessian Pottery

Author(s)
Michał Krueger 1 ✉,
Marta Krueger 2,
Karol Jakubowski 2
Publication Date
This paper makes an attempt to examine the Tartessian ceramics not from a traditional typological posture seeking the chronological sequences, but from an uncommon approach, where experiment plays an important role. The goal is to shed light on these still relatively weakly recognised aspects of the study of the pottery from the South-western part of Iberian Peninsula...

Sherd Shatter Patterns Experiment

Author(s)
S. Evans 1 ✉,
S. Barrera Hernandez 1
Publication Date
In field archaeology, the importance of non-diagnostic sherds is often overlooked. This archaeological experiment suggests that archaeologists should take into greater consideration, contexts where sherds are found grouped together in close proximity. The authors tested a series of experimental drops of modern pots...

Experimental Production of High and Late Medieval Pottery at the Scientific Research Centre in Panská Lhota

Author(s)
Kateřina Těsnohlídková 1 ✉,
Karel Slavíček 1,
Jana Mazáčková 1
Publication Date
Experimental pottery production at the scientific research centre of the Institute of Archaeology and Museology at the Masaryk University Faculty of Arts (from here on ÚAM) in Panská Lhota began in the summer of 2012. The primary target of the experimental pottery production was an attempt to understand the manufacturing process...

Reconstruction of the Geometric Décor Technology of the Bronze Age Ceramics in Siberia

Author(s)
Eva Lamina 1
Publication Date
The grassland and forest steppes ranging from the Ural to the Altai-Sayan mountains were dominated by Andronovo Family cultures during the second millennium BC (the Bronze Age) (Koryakova & Epimakhov 2007; Мартынов 2005). The Andronovo dated ceramic series were characterized by a distinctly expressed geometric ornamentation style...

The Iron Age Iberian Experimental Pottery Kiln of Verdú, Catalonia, Spain

Author(s)
Ramon Cardona Colell 1 ✉,
Josep Pou Vallès 1,
Noelia Calduch Cobos 2,
Borja Gil Limón 2,
José Miguel Gallego Cañamero 2,
Laia Castillo Cerezuela 1
Publication Date
The goal of this project is to reconstruct the operational sequence of manufacture of Iberian Iron Age pottery, from clay procurement to firing in a reconstructed kiln. Although pottery is the most characteristic artefact recovered on Iberian Iron Age excavations, most of its complex processes and production techniques remain poorly known...

An Experimental Comparison of Impressions Made from Replicated Neolithic Linen and Bronze Age Woolen Textiles on Pottery

Author(s)
Lewis Ferrero 1
Publication Date
Textile impressions on pottery provide evidence for fabrics and weaves in areas where the fabrics themselves do not survive. This article argues that the impressions can provide information on the uses of different fibres, the weaving technologies and possible trading or agricultural advances connected with these fibres...

An Experimental Approach to Studying the Technology of Pottery Decoration

Author(s)
Golnaz Hossein Mardi 1
Publication Date
8th UK EA Conference Oxford 2014
***The early Middle Chalcolithic pottery tradition of Seh Gabi Tepe in Iran is called Dalma tradition. Among the different types of Dalma pottery, I have focused on monochrome painted ceramics, to investigate, by means of experimental analysis, how their decoration technology was undertaken...

The Registry of Memory Process Applied to Experimental Archaeology in a Castromao “Oven”

Author(s)
Andrés Teira-Brión 1 ✉,
Josefa Rey-Castiñeira 1,
Clíodhna Ní Líonain 2
Publication Date
7th UK EA Conference Cardiff 2013
***Memory is the cognitive process that codifies, stores and retrieves past actions that are perceived in the present, generating our remembrances and perceptions of the past and informing our knowledge of the world around us (...) Applied to archaeology, memory can be understood as the marks or...

Probable Measure Estimating Tool Employed by the Aeneolithic Potters

Author(s)
Eva Lamina 1
Publication Date
The article proposes that an item, ornamented with a geometric pattern with inscribed diagonal cross and attributed to the Afanasievo culture (Aeneolithic, South Siberia), represents a primitive tool reflecting practical knowledge of basic geometry by the ancient potters. The article suggests an experimental reconstruction method for crafting the proposed instrument, and...