Thoughts on Weeden Island pottery classification: the type-variety system (again)

Abstract

ABSTRACT The existing classification of Weeden Island pottery does not serve the needs of twenty-first-century archaeology and has long been in need of an overhaul. We propose that the type-variety classificatory system, used in the Southwestern US, the Maya region, and the Lower Mississippi valley, could be applied to Weeden Island ceramics. This robust hierarchical system classifies pottery into four nested units: varieties in types, types in ceramic groups, and groups in wares, ideally paste wares to facilitate incorporation of compositional data. In addition, higher-order units, ceramic system and ceramic sphere, are particularly useful for integrating the complexes of individual sites into larger regional syntheses, the basis for investigating intersite relations. We illustrate the classification, its principles and units, with hypothetical names of a subset of Weeden Island pottery from the McKeithen site in north Florida. Type-variety classification provides insights not only into the pottery from an individual site but also into that of a region (e.g., Weeden Island might be termed a ceramic sphere), and, most importantly, into the people who made and used the pottery.