Compositional study of household ceramic assemblages from a Late Neolithic (5300–4500 cal BP) earthen walled-town in the middle Yangtze River valley of China

Abstract

The emergence of earthen walled-towns triggered sociopolitical and economical changes in the Late Neolithic middle Yangtze River valley. However, how town emergence complicated interpersonal relations and promoted a stronger degree of social complexity (evidenced by, for example, the variation in household size, structure and layout, and possessions) within the towns and eventually across the region has remained poorly understood. Utilitarian pottery offers one way to probe into the issue by revealing the degree to which agriculturalists and craftsmen depended on each other for a living and on a daily basis. We present here a compositional study on household ceramic assemblages unearthed from two contemporaneous households at Zoumaling, one of the earliest earthen walled-towns in East Asia. The two households are dated to the Upper Qujialing period (5300–4500 cal BP) but differ in their social and/or wealth status. Through principal component analysis of compositional data extracted from sherds and local clays, we show that at each household, domestic pottery, as well as utilitarian tools (spindle whorls) and personal ornaments (bracelets) made of clay, differ little in chemical composition, being largely produced by clays procured within the walled-town. Furthermore, we suggest that both households have the access to about the same pottery (or pottery producers) pool. It is for the reasons above that we argue for household interdependence within the town but reject the likelihood that secured access to clays, or control over pottery products, led to interhousehold differences and social differentiation at the Zoumaling walled-town.