Pottery, ancient Near EastANNE PORTER AND THOMAS L. MCCLELLAN

From the time of its introduction in the

Neolithic period, pottery quickly became one

of the most common artifacts made and so is

an important tool for the archaeologist. Pottery

served a utilitarian function, such as for the

storage, preparation, and presentation of food

and drink as well as other substances, but it

could also serve as a marker/symbol of individ-

ual or group identity and status, or as an indi-

cation of special activities or contexts which

needed to be distinguished from the ordinary.

Therefore, there are asmanyways archaeologists

may study pottery as there are ways it may

be used. While in some instances pottery may

be considered for its own intrinsic aesthetic or

historical worth (in the context of museum

collections, for example), in general archaeolo-

gists use pottery grouped in space and time to

study bigger questions about ancient societies,

employing various kinds of analyses that range

from the small- to large-scale. Over space,

ceramics assist the identification of room func-

tion within buildings (gathering rooms, store

rooms, cultic rooms); within settlements the

distribution of pottery may help identify the

location of manufacturing, administrative,

domestic, cultic, andmortuary activities; within

regions, who belongs to what kin-group, class,

society, or culture and how that ascription is

achieved. Over time, patterns in the introduc-

tion of new pottery are used to make a chrono-

logical sequence that allows archaeologists to

identify different levels of a site and to connect

occupation levels between sites. Then broader

chronological periods are discerned that facili-

tate interregional comparisons (for an example

see ARCANE Project (2004–2010)). Few ques-

tions can be addressed before the subject of

discussion, be it object or settlement, is attrib-

uted to the appropriate chronological period.

There are many kinds of techniques applied

to the study of pottery. These include scien-

tific, statistical, chronological, aesthetic, and

art-historical analyses. In all these kinds of

analysis however, the basic components of pot-

tery studied are form, which refers to the shape

of the vessel; and ware, which comprises both

the materials of which the pot is made and its

surface treatments, including decoration. As

there are often tens or hundreds of thousands

of potsherds found at single sites, these may be

grouped into more manageable classes based

on similarities in shape, fabric, and decoration.

A fundamental starting point is therefore the

organization of pottery into typologies. From

there, other techniques may be applied to

the typology or the vessel/sherd itself. For

example, the geographical origin of clays

and inclusions may be determined through

petrographic analysis of the sherd, which

helps in pinning down the point of manufac-

ture. This in turn allows archaeologists to track

the transmission of individual vessels in order

to understand its biography or the nature of

exchange networks. A focus on the distribution

of related groups of pots, or assemblages,

gives insight into the life-histories of groups –

societies or cultures – and how they

develop, move, and interact. Measurements of

continuity/discontinuity in assemblages can be

subjective; statistical methods are therefore

Figure 1 Clay goblet decorated with ibex figures,

Iran, 2900–2700 BCE. Museo Nazionale d’Arte

Orientale, Rome. © Photo Scala, Florence.

The Encyclopedia of Ancient History, First Edition. Edited by Roger S. Bagnall, Kai Brodersen, Craige B. Champion, Andrew Erskine,

and Sabine R. Huebner, print pages 5465–5466.

© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2013 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

DOI: 10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah01156

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often employed to see where the changes in a

sequence lie. Residue analysis can determine

the contents of vessels, which might be beer,

wine, oil, salt, bread, animal fats, cosmetics, or

perfumes, which helps in learning what people

ate and in what contexts they used certain

foods and other items. Technological studies

also shed light on methods and techniques of

manufacture, showing whether pots were

handmade/coil-made or produced on a wheel

(slow or fast), or, as is often the case with large

vessels, both. These factors, as well as questions

of furnace use and design, methods and tem-

peratures of firing, types and purposes of

organic and inorganic inclusions, were in the

past thought to indicate levels of technological

sophistication that in turn equated with levels

of social complexity, but such analyses now

more often are used in determining whether

pottery was a local household product or of

mass (industrial) manufacture; or whether it

was controlled by the state. Art historical

approaches, which may concentrate on form

or decorative elements, facilitate understand-

ing of the construction and spread of shared

cognitive systems. Recently ceramic studies

have turned to practice theory (Bourdieu

1990) and the notion of chaıne operatoire

(introduced by Andre Leroi Gourhan). In

these theories the actions of making the vessel

in each stage of themanufacturing process are as

important as the vessel itself in understanding

how andwhy pottery styles, wares, andmethods

are transmitted over time and space, and how

the making and using of pottery shapes social

identity.

REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS

ARCANE Project (2004–2010) [online] [accessed

April 12, 2011.] Available from http://www.

arcane.uni-tuebingen.de/index.html.

Bourdieu, P. (1990) The logic of practice, trans.

R. Nice. Cambridge.

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