From Pottery to Politics: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Political Factionalism, Ethnicity, and Domestic Pottery Style in the Ecuadorian Amazon

A long-standing assumption in archaeological theory is that pottery in the domestic context represents a form of passive style that does not enter into symbolic communication in the political domain. This paper presents ethnoarchaeological data to establish a link between women's active political behavior and pottery style in the domestic context in a small-scale, segmental society in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Analysis of individual variables of style shows that Achuar and Quichua women signify their political alliances in the painted decoration of their domestic pottery more strongly than they signify so-called passive processes of learning associated with early enculturation and ethnicity. Furthermore, analysis of women's judgments of pottery as Achuar or Quichua indicates that they decode cues to political alliances in the pottery of other women, including cues to political differences within and between groups. The theoretical implications of these findings are discussed in terms of the principles underlying women's stylistic behavior as part of the political processes involved in the construction and maintenance of social identity and social boundaries.     

Culinary Crafts and Foods in Southwestern Ethiopia: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Gamo Groundstones and Pottery

Few ethnoarchaeological studies have combined the production and use of groundstones and pottery as indicators of household variation in subsistence and socioeconomics. This ethnoarchaeological study explores how the Gamo people who live in southwestern Ethiopia interact with their culinary tools of pottery and groundstones. One of the unique cultural features of the Gamo is their strict caste system, which forces artisans such as potters and groundstone makers into a full-time specialization. This paper uses a chaîne opératoire analysis regarding groundstone and pottery production and then addresses their use by drawing from household studies from three Gamo communities. The analysis discusses the role that social hierarchy can have on cooking and craft variation within households. Thus, these artisans bring to life crafts that give the Gamo tools to create their daily subsistence, and these tools and foods allow us to explore two key archaeological issues: subsistence and socioeconomic variation of people’s households.     

The Technical Style of Wallaga Pottery Making: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Oromo Potters in Southwest Highland Ethiopia

Pottery making is still practiced widely in parts of Ethiopia but variations in its technical practices are poorly documented. This study presents an ethnoarchaeological investigation of the technical style of pottery making among the Oromo of western Wallaga, located in the highlands of southwestern Ethiopia. The Oromo are a Cushitic-speaking people who occupied Wallaga as part of a massive expansion that occurred between the early sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This resulted in the Oromo settling among Omotic and Nilo-Saharan peoples in Wallaga. Oromo pottery production in the region is passed down through family lines, and these potters use specific technical styles, which are distinct in material properties and production processes from the surrounding non-Oromo communities. Documentation of the technical styles of contemporary potter communities provides a material means for archaeologists to investigate the history and interaction of social groups in the past. Specifically, this study is relevant to investigating the poorly documented history of the Oromo expansion.     

Pottery Use-Alteration as an Indicator of Socioeconomic Status: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of the Gamo of Ethiopia

The use of a pottery vessel leaves markers on the ceramic wall that can inform archaeologists how the vessel functioned in the past. At present, archaeologists have little information for understanding how use-alteration reflects the complex nature of ceramic function and socioeconomic status. I conducted a 2-year ethnoarchaeological research project among the Gamo people of southwestern Ethiopia, who continue to produce and use pottery on a daily basis. This research indicates that interior surface attrition occurs primarily on pottery vessels used in wealthy households because of fermentation processes from high-status foods. Thus, the Gamo example suggests that there is a relationship between ceramic use-alteration and household socioeconomic status.     

I Like You,I Like Your Pottery: An Ethnoarchaeological Approach to Ceramic Distribution and Acquisition in Northeastern Ghana

This article deals with the myriad determinants involved in pottery distribution in northeast Ghana, considered from a theoretical perspective that integrates the materiality of vessels and the social, political and historical context where both communities and pottery operate in their daily practice. Hence, we develop a comprehensive research strategy that combines emic and etic views covering the multiple dimensions of pottery life history. In this sense, production units, technical traditions and the characteristics of the redistributive centres, as well as the strategies for pottery acquisition, are studied. Special attention is paid to quite varied aspects such as the physical properties of vessels and their performance characteristics, the reputation of both vessels and potters according to the consumers and the mobility and connectivity patterns found in the study area. On the other hand, interpretations regarding the historical and sociopolitical context of the region are emphasised, as well as the interethnic relationships amongst groups inhabiting the area.     

Investigating Variation in Organization of Ceramic Production: An Ethnoarchaeological Study in Guizhou, China

This paper discusses variation in the organization of ceramic production among family specialists who use a fast wheel technology in south-central Guizhou, China. There is considerable variation in intensity, output, and scale among potting households in two communities. The paper evaluates the utility of two kinds of potential material indicators for this variation: 1) spatial organization for different steps in production (forming vessels, preparing clay, drying vessels, firing), and 2) degree of vessel uniformity. Although degree of uniformity of vessels does vary with intensity for some dimensions, other factors such as experience of the potter and consumer demand need to be considered. Material features of production areas are more obvious indicators of variation in intensity and output.     

Clays of Contention: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Factionalism and Clay Composition

This ethnoarchaeological study examines sociopolitical constraints on traditional pottery production in Paradijon, southern Luzon, the Philippines. Factionalism divided the potting community as it became involved in elite competition and dictated that the two potting factions acquire clays from sources controlled by elite alliance partners. This study examines patterning in instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) data in relationship to the involvement of independent craft specialists in elite competition. Patterning of INAA data at community and regional levels is found, illustrating the middle-range links between sociopolitical behavior of potters and patterns in clay composition. INAA patterning among clay preparation areas appears dependent on whether a preparation area is in public or private space. Regionally, primary markets express INAA signals from both factions, whereas secondary markets reflect potter participation of a particular faction.     

Building Power in Rural Hinterlands: An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Vernacular Architecture in Tigray,Ethiopia

In Tigray, Ethiopia highland farmers and noblemen used a common vernacular architecture to build places of political authority and power during the last century of Ethiopia's feudal economy. This study contributes to the perspective that domestic houses are active political locales integrated into the larger political landscape. In addition, it is argued that vernacular architectural style generates hierarchical power in part by manipulating building strategies usually attributed to monumental construction. The study concludes that vernacular architecture is actively engaged in rendering a political aesthetic that reproduces state authority in rural hinterlands.     

Pastoralism and Land‐Tenure Change in Kenya: The Failure of Customary Institutions

Until recently, the Pokot in the highlands of the Baringo area in Kenya have practised semi‐nomadic pastoralism. Today they are rapidly sedentarizing and in many areas suitable for farming, they are adopting rain‐fed agriculture. As a result of these dynamics, claims to individual property on de facto communal rangelands have arisen, and to such an extent that they seriously threaten the peace of the community. This article explores the conflicts that emerge in the transition from common property to private tenure. Using locally prominent land disputes as exemplary cases, it focuses on the role of traditional gerontocratic authorities in the attempt to resolve a growing number of land disputes; on the emerging power of patrilineal clans and local elites in the enforcement of access to land; and on the incompetence of government agencies to intervene. The failure of customary institutions to ensure land tenure security leads to a situation in which women and marginalized actors in particular are threatened with displacement, and in which most local actors want the state to intervene and establish formal property rights.     

Domestic Spaces as Public Places: An Ethnoarchaeological Case Study of Houses, Gender, and Politics in the Ecuadorian Amazon

In an ethnoarchaeological case study, we take a gendered perspective on the house as a locus of political life in Conambo, a village of about 200 Achuar- and Quichua-speaking peoples in the Ecuadorian Amazon. In this small-scale society, women and men engage actively in political practice in independent yet complementary ways, and the domestic context is a place where political life is conducted on a daily basis. In this article, the house is examined as a politicized context at three scales of materiality: the organization of settlement in the community, the spatial relationships in the house, and the scale of painted designs on pottery bowls used in the house. At each scale, we identify material correlates of women's and men's participation. Our goal is to bring attention to potential archaeological correlates of women's political involvement in past societies, to question assumptions about women's political lives and domestic spaces, and to expand the ways in which anthropological archaeology may contribute to understanding cross-cultural variation in women's and men's domains of power.     

An Ethnoarchaeological Study of Hafting and Stone Tool Diversity among the Gamo of Ethiopia

The significance of flaked stone tool variation has been a source of great archaeological debate for over 100 years. Even though evidence for stone tool hafting exists as far back as the Middle Paleolithic/Middle Stone Age, there is a dearth of information concerning how hafting affects stone tool technology. This ethnoarchaeological study of hafted stone scrapers among the Gamo of southern Ethiopia examines why a single cultural group utilizes two different hafts, which generate different lithic morphologies, technologies, and spatial distributions. The relationships between history, environment, and social group membership are explored to demonstrate how these associations create variation in technological practices.

Computer Use in Pottery Studies at Aphrodisias

Abstract

This article is intended primarily for archaeologists who may know little about computers, but suspect that the computer might be useful to them in their research. The emphasis is on the application of the computer to ceramics at the site of Aphrodisias, Turkey, where this system of field recording has evolved. The excavations at Aphrodisias have unearthed a relatively continuous stratigraphic sample of pottery from the Chalcolithic through to the Roman and Byzantine periods. This rich and varied corpus of material culture is now being analyzed with the aid of the computer. This article familiarizes the reader with the problems, methodology, and computer mechanics used to retrieve these data and shows how such a system can be used when a direct tie-up with a computer is impossible.     

Nomadism,Pastoralism, Ecology,and Grazing Lands

J. Aschenbrenner and L. R. Collins, eds. The Processes of Urbanism: A Multidisciplinary Approach. The Hague: Mouton Publishers, 1978. x + 424 pp. $40.00.

E. Eames and J. G. Goode. Anthropology of the City: An Introduction to Urban Anthropology. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice‐Hall Inc., 1977. viii + 344 pp.

R. G. Fox. Urban Anthropology: Cities in Their Cultural Settings. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice‐Hall Inc., 1977. xiii + 176 pp.     

Reading Pottery: Literature and Transfer-Printed Pottery in the Early Nineteenth Century

The use of illustrations from literary sources, specifically fiction, on transfer-printed earthenwares in the early nineteenth century is addressed through an example of a household dump in Buckinghamshire, England. This paper examines such ceramics in terms of the nature of fiction and the reading public in Britain during this period and how the production and consumption of literary ceramics is connected to the changing perception of fiction and its accompanying illustrations. The paper argues that the use of literary scenes as patterns on transfer-printed vessels had to mediate both changing perceptions of fiction and ideals of the picturesque and suitable subjects for transfer print patterns.     

Interpreting Intra-site Spatial Patterns in Seasonal Contexts: an Ethnoarchaeological Case Study from the Western Alps

This paper deals with the ethnoarchaeological analysis of the spatial pattern of artefacts and ecofacts within two traditional pastoral huts (a dwelling and a seasonal dairy) in the uplands of Val Maudagna (Cuneo province, Italian western Alps). The composition of the ethnoarchaeological assemblages of the two huts was studied and compared; point pattern analysis was applied to identify spatial processes mirrored in the interactions between objects; Moran’s I correlogram and empirical variogram were used to investigate the effects of trampling on the displacement of objects on the floor. The results were compared with information provided by the herder who still used the huts. The quantitative and ethnographical data enabled inferences to be made that can help in the interpretation of archaeological seasonal sites. The function of a seasonal site can be recognized, as can the impact of delayed curation on the composition of the assemblage and the importance of the intensity of occupation compared with the frequency of occupation. The spatial organization of activities is reflected in the spatial patterns of objects, with clearer identification of activity areas in intensively occupied sites, and there is evidence for the behaviour behind the spatial segregation of activities. Trampling is a crucial post-depositional factor in the displacement of artefacts and ecofacts, especially in non-intensively exploited sites. From a methodological point of view, this research is another example that highlights the importance of integrating quantitative methods (especially spatial analysis and geostatistical methods) and ethnoarchaeological data in order to improve the interpretation of archaeological sites and assemblages.     

Ancient Pottery Surface Treatments from Dakhleh Oasis,Egypt: an Experimental Study

This study examines the heating and cooling effectiveness of three common surface treatments associated with the prehistoric pottery from Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt. Experiments were conducted on replica vessels with plain, compacted and textured surfaces—observations on thermal damage were also taken to explore the relationship between surface treatment and vessel durability. The study is interested in understanding if, and how, these treatments perform differently in heating and cooling the vessel contents. This could help to explain long-term trends in the archaeological record at Dakhleh, particularly shifts in subsistence patterns. Importantly, the study highlights the potential to incorporate more experimental research within the expanding field of Egyptian ceramic studies.     

Resources and spatial analysis at actual Nenets campsites: Ethnoarchaeological implications

The aim of this paper is to present and discuss empirical evidence on the dynamics of occupation and site formation processes from contemporary mobile campsites in Northwest Siberia. The questions posed are derived generally from archaeological studies of Upper Paleolithic record in Europe. We document the active Nenets summer camps at lakes and the abandoned winter and spring camps in the open tundra and the forest tundra. Analysis of the floral and zoological resources shows that plant resources and fish are available predominantly in the summer while reindeer are abundant in these regions in fall and winter when they return from summer pastures further north. When natural resources are not available, groups supplement with food purchased at shops. Within these living camps, “structures évidentes” and “structures latentes” of classical French paleoethnology cannot be distinguished as clearly as at Upper Paleolithic sites: and architectural remains, ash from hearths, and other objects may be removed from the central areas towards the site peripheries. However the investigated camps preserve a discrete structure with interior living areas (including children’s playgrounds), exterior areas with evidence of reindeer carcass processing, woodworking, and other activities, peripheral toss zones, and dispersed activity remains in the surrounding landscape.     

Ethnoarchaeology,Pottery, and Technology: Bridging Ethnographic and Archaeological Approaches

Paul Hockings, ed. Principles of Visual Anthropology. The Hague: Mouton/ Chicago: Aldine, 1975. xiii + 521 pp. Photos, indexes, filmography. $24.50.

Karl G. Heider. Ethnographic Film. Austin: The University of Texas Press, 1976. xiv + 166 pp. Index, catalog of films. $9.95.