Ceramic is fantastic! The life-cycle of pottery through cross-disciplinary studies

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Congrès, colloques, réunions

 

26-30 août 2020
Budapest

 

 

Session #340 - 26th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists : Networking

 

 

Almost 50 years after Schiffer's model (1972), how is the life cycle of potteries addressed by current research? From manufacture to post-depositional alterations through uses, recycling and maintenance, and discard of the ceramics, numerous studies have mainly focused on specific stages of the model or on particular methodological approaches.

 

This session is primarily dedicated to methodological reflection on ceramic. Developments in pottery analysis took different paths depending on time period, culture or region. It is of great interest to interact regardless of spatiotemporal fields and to compare recent researches to improve our archaeological practices.
By gathering studies addressing the "chaîne-opératoire" of making potteries and the "chaîne-opératoire" of consuming potteries, this session wishes to discuss the life cycle of pottery, above the limits of academic fields. Following Braun's inquiry to reconsider "pots as tools" (1983), the study of ceramics is addressed beyond the traditional dichotomy between the finished product and the used product.

 

A wide array of methods is used to reveal the archaeological and anthropological value of ceramics. Petrographic and geochemical analysis may document the provenance of the raw materials, taphonomic alterations, and, along with technological study, the processes of pottery production. Shapes and decoration styles are the basis of typochronological classifications, while use-wear studies and residues analysis investigate the "pot's life" during its use and discard. Finally, experiments and ethnoarchaeological data provide possibilities to compare archaeological pottery with contemporaneous data.
The aim is to share and combine innovative or well-established methods, in order to create a cross-disciplinary and trans-cultural approach of ceramic analysis. Based on worldwide case studies, the participants would discuss their methodology and how they designed their protocols regarding their problematics. Beyond summarisation of recent advances in ceramic analysis, homogenisation of methodologies and vocabulary is now a key issue to make works comparable.

 

Organizers

Pauline Debels, Thomas Delbey, Adrien Delvoye, Mathilde Jean

 

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