Abstract: Introduction 1. Relative and Absolute Chronology 2. The Pottery 3. Metal and Other Finds 4. Settlements and Structures 5. Burial Practices 6. Conclusions

Abstract: The intersection of settlement patterns and material technology has long been of interest to archaeologists. For example, there is a huge body of literature on the relationship between mobility strategies and flaked stone assemblages. Similarly, much has been written on houses and other structures as they relate to mobility patterns. Unfortunately, for a range of reasons, similar effort has rarely been extended to ceramic technologies (but see Arnold 1985, Sassaman 1993, Bright and Ugan 1999, and Simms, Bright, and Ugan 1997). At a general level, it is clear that pottery making and settlement patterns are correlated; pots are commonplace in sedentary societies but uncommon in residentially mobile groups. On theoretical grounds, this finding makes sense. Pots are heavy and taxing to carry during the seasonal round and, because they are fragile, may be exposed to high rates of breakage during residential moves. Further, mobile groups may not stay in one place long enough to complete the production cycle, a process which can take up to several weeks (Arnold 1985). Related to this problem is that the most opportune time to produce pots, the dry season, is also the time when many seeds, berries, and greens ripen, creating time conflicts between gathering and pottery production. Moreover, the small population sizes typically encountered among mobile hunters and gatherers tend to limit the demand for pots, and this prevents people from taking advantage of economies of scale in pot production (e.g., Brown 1989). In sum, pottery technologies do not fit in well with a mobile lifestyle. Despite these obstacles, the anthropological and archaeological record contains numerous examples of mobile groups that produce pots. Understanding how they accomplish this should be of concern to all ceramicists, for it is often from these extremes that we push the

Abstract: Abstract This is the first full and up-to-date survey of Aegean archaeology at the beginning of the Iron Age (late eleventh and tenth centuries BC) since Snodgrass’s classic The Dark Age of Greece (1971). These crucial 150 years in the development of ancient Greek society are known as the Protogeometric period after the characteristic pottery which was commonly in use in the Aegean. The book offers a detailed account of old and new discoveries with chapters on pottery, metal finds, burial customs, and architectural remains (and how to use them to understand the social and political structure of the society). This analysis of the material culture of the period covers not only well-known sites such as Athens and Lefkandi but also other, less familiar, regions, many of which are discussed in English for the first time. In addition, Dr Lemos examines a number of specific issues such as relative and absolute chronology, the introduction of iron technology in the Aegean, and the use of handmade pottery and jewellery. The archaeological record is also used to suggest interpretations of the social and political structure of the society, cult practices, and the use of Homer in understanding the period. The book challenges the description of the period from the collapse of the Mycenean palace system to the formation of early Greek city-states as the ‘Dark Age of Greece’. Dr Lemos argues that some of the advances on socio-economic structures towards the formation of states, which were thought to belong to the eighth century BC, might have started to develop much earlier, in the course of the tenth century.

Abstract: This richly illustrated study offers a comprehensive discussion of medieval and post-medieval pottery from central Greece and the Aegean, and considers the relationship between pottery and Mediterranean society, economy and culture in the post-Roman periods. The main part of the book focuses on pottery from Boeotia, particularly ceramics collected by the Cambridge and Bradford Boeotia intensive survey project. Vroom combines ceramic data from thirty selected Boeotian sites in order to create a regional classification system with 48 diagnostic wares, ranging from locally produced Red Slip wares and amphorae to imported glazed wares from Italy and Turkey. She explores the cultural, technological and socio-economic aspects of local pottery production and distribution, using archaeological, documentary and ethnographic evidence, but also considers the wider picture when looking at the imported tin-glazed wares from the 16th to 18th centuries. In the last part of the book, Vroom combines her study of pottery with a wide range of documentary and pictorial sources to discuss the history of dining habits in the eastern Mediterranean during the Late Roman, Byzantine, 'Turkish' and Early Modern periods.

Abstract: Lead isotope analyses have been undertaken on a group of Islamic lead-glazed pottery artefacts from Fustat, Egypt, spanning the period from the eighth to the 14th century ad, that had previously been the subject of a comprehensive typological, chronological, petrographic and technological study. Comparison of the lead isotope ratios for the glazes with those for lead ores from Egypt, Iran, Tunisia, Anatolia, Greece, Sardinia and Spain provided information on the possible sources of the lead used in the production of the glazes. The results show that the lead used in glaze production by the Islamic potters at Fustat was most probably obtained from distant ore sources in Iran or Tunisia, Sardinia, Spain and the Taurus Mountains. Different ore sources were favoured in different periods and, to a limited extent, for different types of pottery, but at no time did the Fustat potters use the potentially more accessible Egyptian ore sources.

Abstract: Al Mina, at the mouth of the Orontes, some 75 km SW of Chatal Huyuk, has long dominated Greek-Levantine discussions in the Geometric Period (c. 1000-700 BC); the site was the first to reveal an abundance of Greek pottery generally, and still is the findspot of the greatest quantity of Greek Geometric pottery in the Levant - about 1500 sherds. In this volume, the author undertakes an analysis and review of this 'Greek emporion', taking as her main topics for discussion - Al Mina as a 'port of trade', the evidence for Greek residence on the site, Greek geometric pottery in the Levant, and Geometric pottery in Greek-Levantine trade.

Abstract: This intensive, full-coverage survey was conducted by the Universities of Nottingham and Amsterdam in conjunction with the British School at Athens between 1983 and 1988. It covered a territory of just over 70 sq km in central Laconia, extending from the east side of the River Evrotas, close to Sparta, up into the foothills of the Parnon range. The Survey identified over 400 sites, the great majority of them previously unknown, dating variously to the Neolithic, Bronze Age, Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and Veneto-Turkish periods. The new information makes possible a re-evaluation of the settlement history and rural economy of Sparta and Laconia. This is presented in Volume I, in which the ecology and geomorphology of the region set the scene for period by period analyses of the results and implications of the Survey. Volume II assembles the primary data, including a pottery series for each period and separate studies of chipped and ground-stone artefacts, inscriptions, architectural fragments, other finds, and the results of geophysical survey. The site catalogue is complemented by a new gazetteer of archaeological sites in the rest of Laconia. Vol II - Archaeological Data.

Abstract: A methodology is described demonstrating the utility of the compound-specific 14C technique as a direct means of dating archaeological pottery. The method uses automated preparative capillary gas chromatography employing wide-bore capillary columns to isolate individual compounds from lipid extracts of archaeological potsherds in high purity (>95%) and amounts (>200 microg) sufficient for radiocarbon dating using accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS). A protocol was developed and tested on n-alkanes and n-carboxylic acids possessing a broad range of 14C ages. Analytical blanks and controls allowed background 14C measurements to be assessed and potential sources of errors to be detected, i.e., contamination with modern or dead 14C, isotopic fraction effects, etc. A "Russian doll" method was developed to transfer isolated target compounds onto tin powder/capsules prior to combustion and AMS analyses. The major advantage of the compound-specific technique is that 14C dates obtained for individual compounds can be directly linked to the commodities processed in the vessels during their use, e.g., animal fats. The compound-specific 14C dating protocol was validated on a suite of ancient pottery whose predicted ages spanned a 5000-year date range. Initial results indicate that meaningful correlations can be obtained between the predicted date of pottery and that of the preserved lipids. These findings constitute an important step forward to the direct dating of archaeological pottery.

Abstract: This paper looks at the classic polychrome vessels associated with the imperial Inca state in terms of their functional significance and considers the role of these objects in the broader context of elite identity and empire building. The focus is on several dimensions of the ceramic assemblage not normally discussed in studies of Inca pottery including their significance from a culinary standpoint and the gendered associations of this category of material culture. Based on an empirewide analysis of the imperial assemblage, I suggest that viewing Inca pottery as culinary equipment offers a window into the ways in which food, feasting, and gender figured in the negotiation of state power and imperial expansion. To better understand how pots functioned as political tools in the Inca state, ethnohistoric and ethnographic information on Andean foodways is presented together with archaeological data on Inca vessel forms, patterns of distribution, and contexts of finds. The imperial state assemblage is then compared to the local vessel repertoire of a northern Andean polity that was incorporated into the Inca empire shortly before its demise. These different lines of evidence are used

Abstract: This paper explores patterning in ceramic data from an Early Formative component at the site of La Joya, located in southern Veracruz, Mexico. The discussion uses ceramic paste characteristics, in addition to vessel form and decoration data, to suggest that this Early Formative pottery assemblage undergoes an in situ transformation between the “pre-Olmec” Tulipan phase and the “Olmec” Coyame phase. This conclusion is then used to revisit the hypothesis of a Chicharras phase (ca. 1250 B.C.) immigration of Pacific coastal groups into the southern Gulf lowlands (e.g., Clark 1990, 1997; Clark and Blake 1989; Coe and Diehl 1980). A consideration of ceramics from several Isthmian lowland contexts does not support this scenario. The discussion suggests that an over-reliance on the surface characteristics of ceramics at San Lorenzo may have encouraged an erroneous Gulf Olmec origin story.

Abstract: This paper looks at the classic polychrome vessels associated with the imperial Inca state in terms of their functional significance and considers the role of these objects in the broader context of elite identity and empire building. The focus is on several dimensions of the ceramic assemblage not normally discussed in studies of Inca pottery including their significance from a culinary standpoint and the gendered associations of this category of material culture. Based on an empire-wide analysis of the imperial assemblage, I suggest that viewing Inca pottery as culinary equipment offers a window into the ways in which food, feasting, and gender figured in the negotiation of state power and imperial expansion.

Abstract: New research on shell middens in the Algarve region of southern Portugal shows continuity of marine exploitation from the Mesolithic into the early Neolithic periods, where the Neolithic period is defined by the appearance of pottery in c 5500BC. The authors propose that either shellfish remained important to Neolithic people in Portugal or that Mesolithic and Neolithic subsistence strategies co-existed in this area for a relatively long time.

Abstract: For the last two decades, archaeologists have believed that a ceramic type known as Indigena Ware was an imitation of European majolica, produced by colonial Nahuas in Mexico City for lower-class Spanish families. Ideas surrounding the production and consumption of Indigena Ware, as well as majolica in general, have been based on the concepts of Spanish domination and indigenous acculturation. These ideas emphasize European interests in displaying high-value imports to obtain distinction along racial and class lines, and fail to consider indigenous strategies for obtaining power through craft production and display. We begin by critically evaluating the stylistic, iconographic, and technical evidence archaeologists have used to suggest that Indigena Ware was an indigenous product. We present the results from neutron activation analysis of 250 ceramic sherds indicating that Indigena Ware forms its own compositional group, different from Aztec pottery and Spanish majolica, and suggest that Indigena Ware is most likely a Spanish import. The problems this ware presents for classification reveal the limitations of locating power exclusively in the hands of the Spanish and point to ways in which we could overcome this theoretical problem for the study of colonialism in Mexico.

Abstract: The Casas Grandes culture flourished between two well-known regions: Mesoamerica and the North American Southwest An analysis of Medio period (AD 1200-1450) pottery suggests that Paquime, the center of the Casas Grandes world, was dominated by shaman-priests The pottery includes images that document a “classic shamanic journey” between this world and the spirit world These images can be connected to the leaders of Paquime and to valuable objects from West Mexico, indicating that the Casas Grandes leadership had more in common with the Mesoamerican system of shaman-leaders than with the political system of the Pueblo world of the North American Southwest

Abstract: Pottery found at Spirit Cave, Thailand, has been claimed as among the earliest ceramics in the world – a radiocarbon date of 7500 BP being obtained from associated charcoal. However radiocarbon dating of organic resin found on some of the sherds gave a date of around 3000 BP. This is another example of improved precision in dating by pin-pointing the context and using AMS. The authors describe how it was done and assess its validity

Abstract: After the introduction of the pottery tradition of La Hoguette and contemporaneous research on Earliest LBK about 10 to 15 years ago, research onthe spread of farming in Central Europe had somewhat stagnated; there were hardly any major advances in factual knowledge, nor could theoretical models be refined. In the last few years, however, an abundance of new data has appeared, partly deriving from botanical and anthropological analyses. Furthermore, newly available results from excavations in European Russia widenour understanding of the manifold and complex changes occurring during the latter 7th and 6th millennium cal BC.

Abstract: One of the common design characteristics on black-on-white pottery from the eleventh and twelfth centuries in the northern American Southwest is the use of thin, parallel lines (hachure) to fill the interior of bands, triangles, or other forms. This essay explores a proposal offered by Jerry Brody that hachure was a symbol for the color blue-green. Brody's proposal is examined by exploring colors and color patterns used to decorate nonceramic material from the Chaco Canyon region of northwestern New Mexico. His proposal is supported and the implications of this conclusion for Chaco Canyon and for future studies of this nature are discussed.

Abstract: Abstract ‘Archive’ as used in a classical or hellenistic Greek context has a significantly different denotation, in respect of format, location, intention, and audience, from its use in a Near Eastern context. Comparison will best be served by a straightforward description of what we have, together with some attempt to sketch the underlying procedures, assumptions, and values. I shall confine myself to Greek documentation of the archaic, classical, and hellenistic periods, and shall not broach the rather different phenomena and problems presented by the documentation from Roman Italy of the Republic, the Roman empire in general, or Graeco-Roman Egypt. For three reasons, no simple picture of Greek documentary records can be satisfactory. First, though Greek cultural unity was real, Greek political society was a mosaic of well over 150 pieces (some would put the figure much higher), each with its own procedures, although family resemblances and predominant patterns are visible. Second, the recovery of literacy in or by the mid-eighth century bc had far-reaching consequences. Though levels of literacy varied by gender, class, region, and period,2 while much (but not all)3 public and private business could be carried on by non-literates, literacy was widespread enough by the fifth century.

Abstract: The potters' quarter of the ancient city of Sagalassos, southwest Turkey, was one of the largest and most enduring ceramic-producing manufactories in the eastern Mediterranean. The objective of our study was to determine environmental circumstances that favored development of different clay resources in the territory of Sagalassos and to assess utilization of these resources in the local pottery manufactory. The potters' quarter was established where, owing to favorable geological circumstances, a large clay body had developed. The bedrock in the potters' quarter, a tectonized ophiolite sequence, has synclinal structure; hence, surface runoff and groundwater tend to accumulate in its center. The weathering of the basic rock formed a smectite-rich clay with vertic properties. This clay was mined in antiquity, and mineralogical and chemical analyses indicate that it was used for the production of local ceramics from Hellenistic to Byzantine times. It is likely that colluvium on top of the ophiolitic clay at the potters' quarter is related to deforestation and slope processes after the potters' quarter was abandoned. In sum, environmental circumstances determined the location of the artisanal quarter of Sagalassos, with its clay quarrying operation and ceramic manufactory. However, for the local mass-produced Sagalassos red slip ware, the results of our chemical and mineralogical analyses indicate that a different, more suitable clay was used: detrital lake sediments, rich in chlorite and chlorite/smectite mixed layers, located about 8 km from the original artisanal quarter. The choice for this clay was determined both by the presence of a suitable clay deposit, as well as socio-economic circumstances such as land ownership. The site of Sagalassos yielded unique evidence of mining of clay at a ceramic production site, as well as import of nearby clays. The local and imported clays were used side-by-side, but one for the production of common wares and building ceramics, and the other for the manufacturing of luxury fine tablewares. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Abstract: We report on an investigation of several ancient clays which were used for pottery making in northern coastal Peru at a kiln site from the Formative period (ca. 2000–800 BC) in the Poma Canal and at a Middle Sican pottery workshop in use between ca. AD 950 and 1050 at Huaca Sialupe in the lower La Leche valley. Neutron activation analysis, 57Fe Mossbauer spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction were used for the characterisation of the clays. The changes that occur in iron-bearing compounds in the clays depending on the kiln atmosphere and on the maximum firing temperature were studied by Mossbauer spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction. Laboratory firing series under varying controlled conditions were performed to obtain a basic understanding of the different reactions taking place in the clays during firing. The results can be used as models in the interpretation of the Mossbauer spectra observed in ancient ceramics from the same context.

Abstract: tages combined with Corinthian ingenuity enabled the city-state to develop a diverse economy eclipsed only by Athens in the Classical period. The Corinthian economy benefited from trade, particularly with the West. Literary sources provide few details concerning the nature and extent of Corinth's commercial relations, however, and scholars have thus relied on archaeological evidence to document the geographic and chronological extent of this trade. For the Archaic period the export of Corinthian painted pottery has long been documented by the presence of Corinthian finewares throughout the Mediterranean, particularly in Sicily and southern Italy. The rapid decline of this trade in the 6th century and the ascendancy of Attic black figure in Western markets was once regarded as evidence for commercial competition, and even for resultant political hostilities, between Corinth and Athens.2 Such a literal interpretation of the evidence of this pottery has been shown to be unsound, not least because the exclusive dependence on finewares seemed to render the archaeological record mute regarding Corinthian

Abstract: The paper presents the Polish contribution to the geophysical prospection of archaeological sites in Egypt. The beginnings go back to the mid-1980s when surveying started on three sites, but research intensified only after 1997. Summing up, nearly 80 hectares on twenty sites have been prospected to date. The investigated sites represent a broad horizon, in chronological terms (from the 4 th millennium BC to the 2 nd millennium AD) as well as geographical ones (Delta, Middle and Upper Egypt, Oases, Mediterranean and Red Sea coasts). In most cases geophysical surveying has been found useful in mapping buried archaeological features, such as stone and mud-brick foundation walls, tombs, pottery kilns, and fireplaces. At a majority of the sites archaeological excavations have contributed to the verification of geophysical results. In a few cases the interpretation was based on the outcome of previous excavations. The work was carried out in cooperation with the Polish Center of Mediterranean Archaeology of Warsaw University, the German, Austrian, French, American and Dutch Archaeological Institutes in Cairo, several independent research projects and PREDE-CONICET in Buenos Aires.

Abstract: Following on from the successful pilot study funded by Historic Scotland which assessed the previous work and analyses carried out on Scottish White Gritty Ware pottery, a major investigation of the Scottish White Gritty Ware industry was initiated by Glasgow University Archaeological Research Division and funded by Historic Scotland. The project set out to examine the range and type of vessels, the production areas and chemical composition of the clays used in the production of Scottish White Gritty Ware. The chemical and petrographic analyses aimed to identify the source or sources of the pottery and its distribution within Scotland. Over six hundred sherds of pottery from over forty Scottish archaeological sites were evaluated by chemical analysis using ICP, combined with the petrographic examination of a selection of thin sections. Also undertaken as part of the project were the construction of a Scottish White Gritty Ware vessel typology, a limited programme of clay prospection, a review of past scientific work, glaze analysis, chemical comparisons with English and Continental material and a geophysical survey of the Scottish White Gritty Ware kiln site at Colstoun in East Lothian. The petrographic analyses were carried out on the existing thin section collection housed in the National Museum of Scotland and newly prepared examples from sherds especially selected for the study. The results of the analyses have pointed to the production of White Gritty ware in several areas of Scotland from the Scottish Borders to the Moray Firth and have identified those geographic areas that require further research and excavation. This study has put together the largest and one of the most significant datasets for any Medieval European ceramic industry and has created a major platform for any future work on Scottish ceramics.

Abstract: Significant indirect evidence suggests that one of the Classic-period residential groups at Tikal was the residence of a family of potters who produced high-quality painted wares. Delineation of the borders of residential Group 4H-1 at Tikal led me to postulate that the bajo was a major resource zone for ceramic manufacturing rather than a spatially limiting feature. This family of upscale ceramic producers used the adjacent bajo as a source of clay and fuel for firing pottery. The configuration of other groups near Group 4H-1 suggests not only that the people occupying the several groups on this peninsula were related, but that they were all involved in the production, painting, and distribution of fine ceramics. These several residential groups, located on adjacent house lots, define a barrio within Tikal whose occupants formed an extended kin unit sharing an economic focus on the production of high-quality ceramics. A consideration of the contents of trash deposits that were used by the Maya for building fill and a study of the middens found adjacent to residential groups at Tikal provide clues to the location of a specific kiln, or firing area. Broken pottery in the structure fill tells us more than architectural history. In this example, pottery indicates how other aspects of one or more house lots were organized and used. In particular, these data suggest that a barrio-like cluster of households at Tikal, with its own ritual center (Group 5G-I), housed families of ceramic producers who had specifically located their residences in direct proximity to the bajo. The search for the firing facilities associated with the production of ceramics in Group 4H-1 is now a major research focus. “Kilns,” or firing facilities, should be among the various architectural features found “out back,” or located on the margins of a house lot. Kilns may have been of the trench type or free-standing small buildings, possibly within sheds, and are expected outside the perimeter formed by the main buildings of the residential group. The structures facing a plaza or series of plazas that are the most obvious elements of a single household tend to attract archaeological attention. Location of structures “out back,” or peripheral to the residential core buildings, could help define the configuration of household lots.