Ceramic Assemblages Research Articles

The Canadian Excavations at Anemurium in Cilicia. By James Russell, with contributions from C.W.J. Eliot, Hector Williams, Sheila Campbell, Nigel Kennell, and Thomas Boyd (Archéologie et Histoire Romaine 45). Toulouse, Éditions Mergoil 2021. Pp. 155. €36.97. ISBN 978-2-35518-117-7 (paper).

<i>The Canadian Excavations at Anemurium in Cilicia</i>. By James Russell, with contributions from C.W.J. Eliot, Hector Williams, Sheila Campbell, Nigel Kennell, and Thomas Boyd (Archéologie et Histoire Romaine 45). Toulouse, Éditions Mergoil 2021. Pp. 155. €36.97. ISBN 978-2-35518-117-7 (paper).

Sugar refining at Plymouth: archaeological excavations at the Boatyard, Sutton Harbour

SUMMARY An excavation on the eastern side of Sutton Harbour, Plymouth, uncovered the remains of a sugar house and related buildings. Documentary evidence confirms that the sugar house was built anew around the middle of the 17th century and remained active for at least a century, being out of use by 1754. The excavation has produced a large assemblage of ceramics used in the refining of sugar, but very little of it is of local manufacture. Once the sugar house ceased functioning, the ceramics were discarded on site and used to infill structures and build new surfaces. The assemblage includes ceramic forms not previously catalogued in sugar-refining before.

TRACING INTERACTION ON SAMOS ISLAND: POTTERY TRADITIONS AND CONNECTIVITY AT KASTRO-TIGANI AND THE HERAION DURING THE AEGEAN LATE–FINAL NEOLITHIC/WESTERN ANATOLIAN MIDDLE–LATE CHALCOLITHIC

This paper presents the results from the pilot analytical study of the Aegean Late–Final Neolithic/Anatolian Middle–Late Chalcolithic (c. 5500–3200/3000 BC) pottery from the Kastro-Tigani settlement, located in south-east Samos (east Aegean). In addition to Crete, the region of the insular eastern Aegean has produced the earliest evidence for Neolithic habitation. The archaeological traces at Kastro-Tigani are so far the earliest known on Samos, being partly contemporary with the recently discovered Middle–Late Chalcolithic layers at the Heraion, lying in close proximity to the former site, and at the Agriomernos cave (Megalo Seitani) in the north-west part of the island. The re-evaluation of the ceramic assemblage from Kastro-Tigani has led to the laboratory analysis of 34 samples, using a combination of thin-section petrography and Wavelength Dispersive X-Ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy, in order to determine provenance and establish reference groups for the earliest local production on Samos. This first compositional characterisation of the pottery contributes new data in a relatively under-studied region and provides grounds for comparison with analytical results from the Heraion, with the aim to investigate possible relations between the sites. Hence, the identification of different strategies in pottery production, reflected in the overall distinct fabric and chemical groups, further indicates the practice of several production units and the exploitation of various raw material sources at the Pythagoreion/Chora plain. Isolated examples of possible imported ceramic vessels, as well as exotica (e.g. obsidian, acrolithic and Kilia figurines, ring-shaped features, marble vessels,kratiriskoi) are highlighted as markers of macro-scale interaction in the context of Aegean early maritime connectivity.

Ocean-Liner Ceramics: A Red Star Line Assemblage in Antwerp, Belgium.

In contrast to what films such as Titanic would have people believe, scientific knowledge about ocean liners is fairly limited. These boats and their material culture, however, functioned as symbols of modernity par excellence and thus allow a better understanding of the advent of a new world at the turn of the 20th century. The focus of this article is a ceramic assemblage from the Red Star Line, the shipping company that transported some two million migrants from Antwerp (Belgium) to the United States between 1873 and 1934. The analysis of this material provides new insights into the furnishings and daily life aboard these ships. Moreover, the possible reuse of these maritime objects ashore forms a basis for a discussion of the ways in which ordinary people entered into the modern world using material culture and to what extent they might have embraced the values associated with these mass-produced goods.

The Mycenaean Settlement on Tsoungiza Hill. By James C. Wright and Mary K. Dabney (Nemea Valley Archaeological Project 3). Princeton: American School of Classical Studies at Athens 2020. Pp. 1240. $150. ISBN 978-0-87661-924-7 (cloth).

<i>The Mycenaean Settlement on Tsoungiza Hill</i>. By James C. Wright and Mary K. Dabney (Nemea Valley Archaeological Project 3). Princeton: American School of Classical Studies at Athens 2020. Pp. 1240. $150. ISBN 978-0-87661-924-7 (cloth).

Functional and Stylistic Considerations of Mixed Grog- and Shell-Tempered Late Mississippian Pottery from the Nashville Basin

Abstract Mississippian period ceramic assemblages in the Nashville Basin region of Tennessee are traditionally viewed as being overwhelmingly shell tempered. Our petrographic analyses of 30 ceramic sherds from three Middle Cumberland sites have revealed, however, the presence of grog, or crushed potsherds, in shell-tempered pastes in over 40% of our specimens. In our study, serving vessels are often tempered with both shell and grog, with one bowl rim containing solely grog. Cooking vessels tend to be tempered with coarse shell and contain only incidental grog. Grog tempering alongside shell has been only occasionally noted elsewhere in the regional literature, but the lack of its widespread recognition may be due to the difficulty of identification without the assistance of a petrographic microscope. It is not clear whether the addition of small grog particles to a shell-tempered paste offers any immediate functional advantages. Other studies suggest that grog temper could improve the workability of the clay, may reduce thermal shock, and may enhance a vessel's resistance to mechanical stress. The strong correlation of fine grog and shell temper with bowls, however, may constitute a low-visibility horizon marker for an extensive swath of the Late Mississippian culture area.

Tel ‘Afar (Tell al-Akhdar): A Monastic or Estate Church on the Via Maris South of Caesarea

ABSTRACT A monumental building at the coastal site of Tel ‘Afar, on the Via Maris—the road linking Antioch and Alexandria, was previously identified as the villa of a wealthy citizen of Caesarea. A new geological and archaeological survey at the site and re-examination of the findings from previous excavations, provide a new interpretation of the function and character of this building. Taken together, the analysis of the ceramic assemblage and the architectural plan along with the elements, all suggest that the structure was a Christian basilica, dated to the Byzantine period (6th–mid-7th centuries ce). Therefore, this evidence calls for a revaluation and classification of Tel ‘Afar either as a monastery or church on a private coastal estate.

Ordinary tables. Post-medieval pottery from the Ravenna countryside as an archaeological and social indicator: new evidence from the castle of Bagnara di Romagna (circa 16th-18th century).

The present study aims at providing an overall picture of the post-medieval ceramic assemblage recovered from the castle of Bagnara di Romagna (Ravenna), in the course of archaeological investigations conducted by the local Superintendency in the early 2000s. In this respect, the main purpose of the paper is to investigate matters related to pottery circulation and consumption in a rather peripheral area of the province of Ravenna, nonetheless close to important trade routes, given its vicinity to Faenza and Imola.

CULTURAL HYBRIDIZATION IN THE AEGEAN EARLY BRONZE AGE: THE POTTERY FROM AIGION IN ACHAEA

SummaryAround the middle of the third millennium BC drastic changes occur in the Aegean in several aspects of material life. One such important change is the introduction of Anatolianizing shapes and features into the ceramic traditions of the Cyclades and the southern east‐central Greek Mainland. In this article, I use the ceramic assemblage from the Minasian plot at Aigion to explore these ceramic changes in the southern Greek mainland (Peloponnese) within the framework of cultural hybridization theory. By focusing on the specific example of Aigion, I discuss the multiple factors which contribute to ceramic hybridization, while I explore their impact on our understanding of broader cultural change at Aigion at this time.

The Archaeology of the Bronze Age Levant: From Urban Origins to the Demise of City-States, 3700–1000 BCE

The Archaeology of the Bronze Age Levant: From Urban Origins to the Demise of City-States, 3700–1000 BCE

Later Stone and Iron Age Cohabitation at the Nsongezi Open-Air Site, Western Uganda

Abstract This research at the Nsongezi open-air site examines the intergenerational artefacts at a site where the first Stone Age artefacts were identified in Uganda. The purpose was to examine the nature and cause of the mixed Later Stone Age (LSA) and Iron Age (IA) artefacts in the same stratigraphic context at Nsongezi. The specific objectives included examining the ceramic assemblage, discussing the nature of interactions between the Later Stone Age and Iron Age people and accounting for why and how the mixture of artefacts occurs at Nsongezi. Using a documentary review, archaeological survey, and excavation, the research re-examines the theories of displacement and coexistence concerning the LSA and IA material mixture, which has always been dismissed as a disturbance of stratigraphic contexts. Guided by the Law of superimposition, the association of archaeological material from different cultural periods such as the Later Stone Age and Iron Age artefacts at Nsongezi is attributed to four phenomena. First is the cultural interaction of distinct LSA and IA populations. Secondly, the LSA populations may have adopted Iron Age technology and pottery while continuing with some of the LSA technology and pottery. Thirdly, the Iron Age populations occupied the LSA sites previously abandoned, and some of the LSA peoples occupied the old Iron Age sites as the two groups crisscrossed the region in shifting agricultural and hunter-gatherer economies. Finally, the mixed LSA and Iron Age deposits might have resulted from post-abandonment taphonomic processes. Therefore, the social interactions between the LSA and IA at Nsongezi challenge the dominant narrative that the IA populations used their metal technology’s superiority to displace and absorb the LSA people.

Technological Characterization of Almohad Pottery Glazes from SW Mallorca (Balearic Islands, Spain)

In this paper, we addressed the chemical composition and main features of a glazed Almohad ceramic assemblage recovered from Puig de Sa Morisca, a rural Islamic site located in southwest Mallorca. The glazes were analyzed by means of scanning electron microscope equipped with energy-dispersive spectrometer (SEM-EDS). The archaeometrical analysis conducted allowed us to characterize the technological choices applied by potters from the end of the 12th century and the beginning of the 13th century. The exclusive use of lead-silica glazes was confirmed, which in some cases was opacified with tin. We also established that some tableware vessels, which were imported to the island, have shown glazes with a particular composition within the analyzed record.

Storage Vessels as Indicators of Crisis Management

This article assesses the distribution of storage vessels, pithoi and jars in an effort to evaluate surplus management strategies connected to political and environmental conditions in the southern Levant in the second millennium BCE. We examined 27 ceramic assemblages from four Middle Bronze–Late Bronze sites in northern Israel: two rural sites (Tel Qashish and Tel Yoqneʾam) and two urban centres (Tel Hazor and Tel Beth-Shean). We then examined how variability in storage activity relates to major historical, political and climate changes recorded in the Levant within the chronological framework of the study. Our results suggest that the relative frequency of storage vessels varies according to type of settlement, is somewhat impacted by political events, and is weakly related to climatic events. This highlights the potential importance of focusing upon datasets that quantify the response of societies to political and climatic change as a measure of the latter’s effect on the past. The results also allow us to suggest a change in the distribution system of Bronze Age urban centres.

Continuity and change in the ceramic assemblage from Metsamor between the 10th and 7th centuries BCE (new data from the 2021 season)

The morphology and distribution of what is considered as a local pottery assemblage from the Iron I and Iron II phases, which in Metsamor is part of a larger cultural phenomenon designated as the Lchashen–Metsamor pottery horizon, is the subject of continued discussion in terms of its continuity and change. This presentation, expanding on previous, preliminary research (see Iskra and Zakyan 2019; 2022), considers the input of new findings resulting from an examination of the results of the most recent excavations by an Armenian-Polish team, concentrated on phases of peak development (V and IVb) and gradual decline of urban life (IVa) in the Iron Age at this fortress site in Armenia. The discussion also contextualizes current knowledge of the presence of Urartian Red Burnished Ware in the Metsamor settlement, especially during the initial phase of Urartian presence, that is, in Phase IVa.

RURAL SOCIAL DIFFERENTIATION IN EARLY CLASSIC CHUNHUAYUM, YUCATAN, MEXICO

AbstractThis article examines rural social differentiation in Chunhuayum, Yucatan, a rural village continuously occupied from approximately 800 b.c.–a.d. 1000. Focusing on the late Early Classic (a.d. 400/500–600/630), a time when other settlements of the Uci polity experienced political and population disruptions, I examine how households shaped and expressed local social differentiation, particularly wealth, occupation, and social connectivity. Residential architecture provides the most salient marker of wealth differences at Chunhuayum, while ceramic, shell, and obsidian assemblages indicate that households also varied in terms of their occupations and external social networks. Within this predominantly agrarian village, two households attempted to improve their economic and immaterial well-being through locally innovative strategies—shell crafting and group-oriented ritual orchestration. Such strategies ultimately had different outcomes both for the household and community. These points underscore the heterogeneity of the rural ancient rural Maya, and that social differentiation was actively constructed by rural people rather than a trickling-down of the normative hierarchical social order. Through habituated practice and innovative action, Chunhuayum's Early Classic residents continued participating in external networks while shaping locally meaningful relations of differences.

Testing the Petra Garden and Pool Complex chronology through the ceramics

The Petra Garden and Pool Complex in the ancient city center has been dated based on stratigraphy and an array of diagnostic finds. The present study of the coarse wares from selected contexts at the site (augmented by amphorae and fine wares) aims to show corroborative evidence from the ceramic assemblage to support the dating of three major phases in the history of the complex: the construction of the monumental Nabataean garden and pool complex in the end of the 1st century BCE, the Roman renovations in the early 2nd century CE and, last but not least, the second destruction that ended the occupation of the complex, most probably at the end of the 6th century CE. The overall purpose of this paper is to contribute to the knowledge of Petra coarse-ware pottery from the Nabataean and Roman periods.

Apprentice and Wage Laborer Economies in the British Caribbean: An Examination of Post-Emancipation Material Culture and Housing on St. Kitts, West Indies

ABSTRACT In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, sugar plantations in the British Caribbean struggled with falling sugar prices and increasing debts. Enslaved Africans suffered the brunt of much of this financial hardship, but they created strong social and trade networks that helped alleviate some of these hardships. Emancipation in the British Caribbean brought many changes to the lives of the formerly enslaved, but estate owners and island governments sought to enact laws that forced people to stay in plantation villages. This study examines the pre- and post-emancipation housing and ceramic assemblages from two households in a plantation village on the British Caribbean island of St. Christopher (St. Kitts) to understand how people adapted to freedom in the post-emancipation period. We find that there are differences in housing and ceramic acquisition and discard between the two households that reflect different investment strategies and agency.

Innovations of the Beginning of the Sixth Millennium BC in the Northern Pontic Steppe

Abstract This study focuses on the pottery-bearing (“Neolithic”) sites of the northern Azov Sea region. The vessels ornamented with comb imprints appeared there in the sixth millennium BC. In the light of a recent re-dating of the Rakushechny Yar site sequence, the sites of the northern Azov region appeared to be the earliest evidence for this innovation. The innovation in the ceramic assemblage is accompanied by an innovative lithic tool set. The latter included macro-blades and fan-shaped end-scrapers, which were previously unknown in the studied region. Their reanalysis (including new field work at the single-layer site of Chapaevka) helped formulate a hypothesis of maritime transmission of comb-ornamented ceramics in the Black and Azov Sea. This hypothesis will stimulate further discussions regarding the ways of Neolithization in Eastern Europe. It underlines the connections between Balkan “classic” Neolithic and pottery-bearing sites of the Ukrainian Steppe. The impressed ware from Makri and other mainland Greek sites is treated as the closest analogy to the finds of the northern Azov Sea region.

A field study of ceramics bearing pan-Black Sea decorative motifs from Sinop, Turkey, using pXRF

Though established in the 7th century BCE as an Ionian colony, Sinop (classical Sinope) served as a hub of maritime activity since at least the Early Bronze Age (3rd-2nd millennium BCE). Located in a protected natural harbor on the southern Black Sea coast, Sinop has throughout its history been better integrated into spheres of interaction with the larger Black Sea world rather than the Anatolian interior. Recent excavations at the Sinop Kale site uncovered a stylistically diverse assemblage of handmade ceramics which raises questions about interregional interaction around the Black Sea during the pre-Greek colonial period that may be addressed through ceramic sourcing methods. This paper presents a compositional analysis of handmade ceramics from Sinop bearing a rope-like pan-Black Sea decorative technique using portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) that answers specific questions of production and interaction at the site. In particular, it seeks to distinguish between non-local production and non-local technological styles produced locally, employing pXRF as a field technique. Results demonstrated that despite the visible diversity of the assemblage, handmade ceramics were primarily produced locally, as communities with distinct ceramic traditions moved through the Sinop Kale site.

HLYBOKE OZERO 2, BONDARYKHA, SUBOTIV: THE COMPARISON OF CERAMICS ASSEMBLAGES AND SOME METHODICAL PROPOSALS

The paper provides an approbation of the procedure of structuring and comparison of prehistoric ceramics assemblages.&#x0D; The proper tasking in the development of typology of ancient pottery, from the «etic» position of analysis, as the author argues, lies in the search of any non-accidental patterns within artifacts assemblages, which could be most likely regarded as a manifestation of a «meaning». These ones could be revealed by analysis of general morpho-functional classes (which enable to investigate real categories, meaningful within past cultures) and by applying the «data mining» techniques (for finding out hidden patterns in arrays of continuous numerical attributes). Statistical and multivariate methods are also crucial in comparative analysis of bulk arrays of artifacts.&#x0D; To solve this tasks, it is proposed to apply: (1) measures of assemblages diversity (richness, entropy, effective number of species and evenness); (2) Pearson’s χ2 association test and correspondence analysis; (3) tests on morphological homogeneity of assemblages, procedures of separation of morphologically homogeneous groups; (4) statistical characterization of morphological groups; (5) comparison of morphological groups by means of multivariate analysis of variances (MANOVA), canonical discriminant analysis and regression «decision trees».&#x0D; The analysis of three assemblages of the Late Bronze Age final stage from the Dnipro-Dinets’ rivers interflew (Hlybore Ozero 2, Bondarykha and Subotiv) allowed to formalize their characteristics and dissimilarities. This creates a base for further researches, particularly in the field of pre-historical reconstructions.&#x0D; It has been revealed that the Subotiv’s ceramic assemblage is typologically more diverse than assemblages of Siverskiy Dinets’ region sites. On the other hand, specificity of the Hlyboke Ozero 2 (site arose on re-worked Timber-Grave Culture traditions) is evident in quantitative parameters of morphological classes, while the Bondarykha and the Subotiv are rather similar in this measure.&#x0D; Analysis of pot-like vessels indicates specificity of Subotiv’s pottery production: local pots are distinctive by relative neck height and heaps height. Comparison of the Hlyboke Ozero 2 and the Bondarykha Culture assemblages shows much the less dissimilarities between these groups than between them and the Su­botiv’s one.&#x0D; Pots from the Hlyboke Ozero 2 and the Subotiv show slight morphological heterogeneity within the class.