Seventy Years of Pottery Studies in the Archaeology of Mesolithic and Neolithic Sudan

This review article examines seventy years of research and methodological approaches to the analysis of Mesolithic and Neolithic pottery in Sudan. It begins with the studies done by A. J. Arkell at the end of the 1940s, leading to the definition of the Khartoum Mesolithic and Khartoum Neolithic ceramic traditions. The article then discusses the application of the concepts of ware, fabric, decorative technique, and chaîne opératoire to the analysis of pottery and the use of new classification tools and archaeometric methodologies. The implication of the concepts of cultural encounter and the communicative role of material culture for ceramic studies and the insights that ceramics can provide for understanding the interrelationships between humans and the landscape are also discussed.

Before and After the Eleventh Century AD in the Territory of Sagalassos

This chapter discusses the settlement evolution in the territory of Sagalassos (south-west Turkey) from the start of the Byzantine period until the thirteenth century when Sagalassos was ultimately abandoned and habitation moved to new locations in and around the modern village of Ağlasun. Problems regarding the archaeological recognition characterize the Byzantine material culture of the region. Recent excavations at Sagalassos together with focused ceramic studies and ongoing intensive surveys are changing this and providing insights into a history of habitation that is not uniform within the territory and that is sometimes at odds with processes occurring in Anatolia at large.

Current Research: A Pilot Study in the Use of pXRF Analysis of Caddo Ceramics

Wilson "Dub" Crook III's paper presented to the East Texas Archeological Conference concerning the use of X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) in sourcing turquoise artifacts sparked an interest in utilizing pXRF to resolve an old Caddo ceramic research question. While XRF has been used in archaeology for more than 60 years, and there have been applications in ceramic studies, a recent review of the 9th Edition of The Archaeology, Bioarchaeology, Ethnohistory, and History of the Caddo Indian Peoples of Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas, a comprehensive bibliography, did not yield a single reference to a pXRF study in Caddo ceramics. This article will summarize: (1) the research question arising from work at the Morse Mound Site (41SY27), (2) an overview of how pXRF works, and (3) the data analysis from this pilot study.

Foculi (fire pots) discovered at the legionary fortress of Potaissa. Case study: centuriae from praetentura sinistra

Faced with a tumultuous end of the 2nd century and the harsh realities of the 3rd century AD, the Roman legionaries of Potaissa were forced to adapt to new living conditions and to overcome their daily needs by replacing and using the materials that were at hand or most convenient and easy to acquire at that time. One of the noteworthy observations here is the fact that almost no traces of heating systems have been identified. This situation raised different questions, as it is very hard to imagine how soldiers survived the harsh winters of Roman Dacia without heat sources. The answer came after a careful analysis of the ceramic material unearthed here. As a result, a new type of pottery has been identified, having bronze braziers as their precursor. It is for the first time that this type of pottery has been identified in Romania, as far as ceramic studies are concerned. In the praetentura sinistra, which will be the focus of this article, a total of 1621 wares were identified and analyzed, out of which 22% (218) are represented by this new type which we will call foculus/foculi. A number of approximately 1000 such earthen pots have been discovered in the entire Roman fortress, bearing in mind the fact that mostly rims and bases were kept during the archaeological campaigns throughout the years. We can estimate that their initial number was considerably higher.

Ceramic studies: examining the full spectrum

These three books range from the clinical (Hunt) to the folksy (Woodward and Hill), and might be seen as a progression. One travelling from the Hunt-edited encyclopaedia with its emphasis on new and exotic scientific analytical techniques, rigorous theoretical approaches and data analysis, through the Integrative approaches book using techniques and ideas that have proved effective for decades (this book is firmly within the mainstream of recent excellent pot books that have a very strong US contribution, as exemplified by Quinn 2009), to the English, and almost quaint, re-issue of Woodward and Hill outlining post-processualist concerns and quite devoid of any black box ‘gee-whiz’. Their combined 1200 pages, heavily featuring petrography, often alongside geochemistry, show that these sorts of ceramic studies, although often regarded as comatose-inducing, are in favour again.