Ceramic Studies in Archaeology: An Updated Exploration of Materials Science Methods in Anthropology: Assessments and Interpretations

THIS SECTION INCLUDES RECENT EXAMPLES of works devoted primarily to the assessment and interpretation of scientific and cultural information on ceramic production, distribution, and use, and includes examples from prehistoric and historical archaeology around the world, spanning polar to tropical environments. It also includes the evolution of domesticated plants and animals and new trends on foodways and cookware. As

discussed above, Dean Arnold’s major study Ceramic Theory and Cultural Process and his subsequent volumes Social Change and the Evolution of Ceramic Production and Distribution in a Maya Community, The Evolution of Production Organization in a Maya Community, and Maya Potters’ Indigenous Knowledge are good cultural interpretations of ceramic production.

For broadly inclusive volumes that consider foodways, readers should consult Christine Hastorf’s The Social Archaeology of Food; The Archaeology of Food, by Katheryn Twiss; and the collections Ancient Foodways, Ceramics before Farming, and Ceramics in Circumpolar Prehistory, which examines the influence of pottery cooking technologies on northern lifeways. Those seeking to better understand the role of ceramic production in shaping lifeways and material culture across archaeological contexts should peruse the edited volumes Mobility and Pottery Production, Social Dynamics of Ceramic Analysis, Innovative Approaches and Explorations in Ceramic Studies, and Archaeological Ceramics.

Many regional studies have also emerged in recent decades, investigating the implications of ceramic production for societal functioning and material culture, including a number that evaluate ceramic materials derived from the Americas. Those focused on South America include Michael Shott’s aforementioned Pottery Ethnoarchaeology in the Michoacán Sierra; the collection Pottery Economics in Mesoamerica; Ancient Maya Pottery, edited by James Aimers; and Made to Order, a study of the ancient city of Teotihuacan by Cynthia Conides. The collection Ceramic Identification in Historical Archaeology and Ceramic Production in Early Hispanic California by Russell Skowronik, M. James Blackman, and Ronald Bishop consider findings from North America—California in particular—to examine everyday life and culture in the region through ceramic analysis.

Turning to contemplate Africa, the Mediterranean world, and the Middle East, readers will encounter even more numerous publications interpreting ceramic materials. For a look at a modern African society, John Arthur’s Living with Pottery, mentioned previously, is a notable ethnoarchaeological analysis of ceramics among the Gamo of southwest Ethiopia. Books on the Middle East contemplate both ancient and modern time frames. Texts focusing on ancient periods include the collections Painting Pots, Painting People; Ceramics in Transitions, a study of ancient Anatolia and the southern Caucasus; The Emergence of Pottery in West Asia; Ceramics of the Merv Oasis, by Gabriele Puschnigg; Gloria London’s Ancient Cookware from the Levant, noted earlier; and The Origins and Use of the Potter’s Wheel in Ancient Egypt, by Sarah Doherty. Readers can find a modern analysis in the edited volume Palestinian Traditional Pottery. Noteworthy studies of the ancient Mediterranean world encompass John Lund’s Study of the Circulation of Ceramics in Cyprus from the 3rd Century BC to the 3rd Century AD; Eleni Hasaki’s Potters at Work in Ancient Corinth; Roman Pottery in the Archaeological Record, by J. Theodore Peña; the collection Ceramics, Cuisine and Culture; and Astrid van Oyen’s How Things Make History.

Fewer works examine northern Europe, although substantial treatments that probe cultural, political, and economic history through ceramic analysis include Amsterdam Ceramics, edited by Jerzy Gawroński; Kostalena Michelaki’s assessment of Bronze-Age Hungary, Household Ceramic Economies; and Ivor Nöel Hume’s If These Pots Could Talk, a look at 2,000 years of British household pottery.

Readers searching for texts on Asia and Oceania will appreciate the second edition of Patricia May and Margaret Tuckson’s The Traditional Pottery of Papua New Guinea, as well as Earthenware in Southeast Asia, edited by John Miksic.