Continuity and change in pottery manufacture between the early and middle Neolithic of Romania

This paper provides the first scientific comparison between pottery production in the early Neolithic Star?evo-Cri? and middle Neolithic Vin?a cultures of south-eastern Europe. The author investigates whether Star?evo-Cri? pottery technology was transmitted to the succeeding Vin?a culture, which in other respects was more complex and technologically advanced. The study compares pottery production at two sites, in different regions of Romania, which were occupied in both periods. Samples of 102 pots from the Star?evo-Cri? and Vin?a phases at Par?a, located in Romanian Banat, and Miercurea Sibiului Petri? in Transylvania, were analysed petrographically and geochemically. There are only minor differences found in the pottery technology between the two sites within each phase, but there were significant changes in pottery technology between the Star?evo-Cri? and Vin?a cultures. These changes are more subtle than might have been expected, however, given the rapid developments in other aspects of material culture.     

Anza,ca. 6500–5000 B.C.: A Cultural Yardstick for the Study of Neolithic Southeast Europe

Abstract

The site of Anza is of major importance by virtue of its geographical position in the central Balkans (FIG. 1) and its unique stratigraphy. The excavations at Anza have yielded a variety of types of information that add to our understanding of the early stages of the [Pottery] Neolithic period, of the succeeding Star?evo Neolithic culture, and of the formation of the Vin?a civilization.     

NEUTRON ACTIVATION PATTERNING OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL MATERIALS AT THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH ‘DEMOKRITOS’: THE CASE OF BLACK‐ON‐RED NEOLITHIC POTTERY FROM MACEDONIA,GREECE

A short history of the application of NAA in the characterization of archaeological materials at the National Center for Scientific Research ‘Demokritos’, Athens, is presented. NAA was first applied in archaeology in 1974 at the Radioanalytical Laboratory, and since 1989 has been one of the primary analytical techniques of the ‘Demokritos’ archaeometry programme. A case study is also presented, concerning chemical patterning of the black‐on‐red Neolithic pottery class from Macedonia. Four chemical groups were identified, each corresponding to a different area of production. It is shown that this standardized concept of pottery technology and style was spread out within at least eastern Macedonia.     

Between the Vinča and <Emphasis Type="Italic">Linearbandkeramik</Emphasis> Worlds: The Diversity of Practices and Identities in the 54th–53rd Centuries cal BC in Southwest Hungary and Beyond

Perhaps nowhere in European prehistory does the idea of clearly-defined cultural boundaries remain more current than in the initial Neolithic, where the southeast–northwest trend of the spread of farming crosses what is perceived as a sharp divide between the Balkans and central Europe. This corresponds to a distinction between the Vin?a culture package, named for a classic site in Serbia, with its characteristic pottery assemblage and absence of longhouses, and the Linearbandkeramik (LBK), with equally diagnostic but different pottery, and its apparently culturally-diagnostic longhouses, extending in a more northerly belt through central Europe westward to the Dutch coast. In this paper we question the concept of such a clear division through a presentation of new data from the site of Szederkény-Kukorica-d?l?. A large settlement in southeast Transdanubia, Hungary, excavated in advance of road construction, Szederkény is notable for its combination of pottery styles, variously including Vin?a A, Ra?i?te and LBK, and longhouses of a kind otherwise familiar from the LBK world. Formal modelling of its date establishes that the site probably began in the later 54th century cal BC, lasting until the first decades of the 52nd century cal BC. Occupation, featuring longhouses, pits and graves, probably began at the same time in the eastern and western parts of the settlement, starting a decade or two later in the central part; the western part was probably the last to be abandoned. Vin?a pottery is predominantly associated with the eastern and central parts of the site, and Ra?i?te pottery with the west. Formal modelling of the early history of longhouses in the LBK world suggests their emergence in the Formative LBK of Transdanubia c. 5500 cal BC followed by rapid dispersal in the middle of the 54th century cal BC, associated with the ‘earliest’ (älteste) LBK. The adoption of longhouses at Szederkény thus appears to come a few generations after the start of this ‘diaspora’. Rather than explaining the mixture of things, practices and perhaps people at Szederkény with reference to problematic notions such as hybridity, we propose instead a more fluid and varied vocabulary, encompassing combination and amalgamation, relationships and performance in the flow of social life, and networks; this makes greater allowance for diversity and interleaving in a context of rapid change.     

Ceramic Traditions and Cultural Identities: West‐Central France during the Late Neolithic II Period (c.3400–2900 cal. BC)

Pottery is generally used as the main basis for characterizing Neolithic cultural identities: archaeologists tend to define groups and cultures in time and space on the basis of typological classification. This paper proposes a different approach to the study of pottery that takes into account the various steps of the chaîne opératoire of manufacture, particularly the methods used to form and finish the pots, in order to characterize the cultural landscape of the Late Neolithic II period in west‐central France (3400?2900 BC). This cultural landscape has hitherto been poorly defined and subject to endless debate since the 1950s, largely because the pottery is fairly homogeneous in shape and is mostly undecorated. The technological study presented here, based on the examination of 23 ceramic assemblages and focusing on a variety of stages in the chaîne opératoire, has allowed the definition of three technical traditions. The main characteristics and diagnostic features of these traditions are outlined below, together with their interrelationships.     

Excavations at Opovo, 1985–1987: Socioeconomic Change in the Balkan Neolithic

Abstract

This is the second preliminary report of excavations and analyses of Opovo-Ugar Bajbuk, a Neolithic settlement of the Vin?a-Plo?nik culture located in the lower Tami? river valley, NE Yugoslavia. The Opovo Archaeological Project began in the summer of 1983; this report coversthe 1985–1987 field seasons. Work at Opovo has continued to reveal more about the unusual reliance placed by the site’s inhabitants on wild food resources, the apparent lack of long-term settlement occupation, and the social organization of production and consumption. An unexpected find of the 1987 season was a fragment of linen, the earliest direct evidence for textile production in European prehistory. Detailed examination of methods of house construction and house destruction—part of an effort to investigate the role of households at the site—led to the discovery of the first two-story dwelling ever encountered at a Vin?a site. The site of Opovo-Ugar Bajbuk is providing new light on previously unknown dimensions of variation within the Vin?a culture.     

Two‐needle knitting and cross‐knit looping: early bronze age pottery imprints from anatolia and the caucasus

There is ample evidence for the use of prehistoric loom‐woven, tabby fabric (made by plain warp and weft technique) in the construction of pottery. Ancient potters from the steppe regions of central Asia through to Anatolia and in some parts of Europe sometimes built their wares aided by old fragments of cloth and basketry, which left impressions on and in the walls of their vessels. In the highlands of eastern Turkey at the site of Sos Höyük and at Chobareti, in Georgia, the impressions on Early Bronze Age pottery include an array of textiles and, notably, what appears to be the earliest known evidence for two‐needle knitting and for the continued use of the single‐element, cross‐knit looping (also known as Coptic ‘nalbinding’) made using an eyed‐needle, a craft which has been found in Pre‐Pottery Neolithic contexts of the Levant. Various basketry techniques are also represented.     

PETROGRAPHIC AND GEOCHEMICAL EVIDENCE FOR LONG‐STANDING SUPPLY OF RAW MATERIALS IN NEOLITHIC POTTERY (MENDANDIA SITE,SPAIN)

Pottery from the Neolithic Mendandia site has been studied. The radiocarbon dating of the site corresponds to a range of dates from 7488–7546 cal bc to 5283–5437 cal bc : the first occurrence of pottery is dated at 5968–6040 cal bc for the lower level III, and up to 5386–5560 cal bc for level II. The antiquity of the potsherds places them within the oldest pottery production sequences in the Iberian Peninsula, which adds to the interest of this study. Ten potsherds from level II and five from level III are analysed for their petrographic and chemical characterization. The petrographic data show two different methods of raw materials manufacture—intentionally tempered pottery (ITP), using calcite and/or limestone and grog, and naturally or non‐intentionally tempered pottery (NTP). According to the matrix paste features, on the basis of the amount, shape, and average or size range of the mineral inclusions, clayed (type A) and sandy (type B) paste types were established and related to two different source areas. The chemical features also indicate two raw material sources and are in agreement with the petrographic paste types. The absence of significant chemical and mineralogical differences between the pottery from levels II and III suggests two contrasting areas for raw materials supply that lasted for at least 600 years.     

Testing technological practices: neutron activation analysis of neolithic ceramics from Valencia,Spain

Using instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) of prehistoric pottery, daub, and modern clay samples from Valencia, Spain, we tested expectations on changes in raw material use with socio-economic shifts during the Neolithic (ca. 5600–2800 BC). Elemental analysis identified three distinctive clay source groups used by Neolithic potters. Contrary to expectations, a shift in raw material use was identified between the Early and Middle Neolithic despite general similarities in technological practices. In the Late Neolithic, pottery production became more specialized, but potters used the same range of clay sources documented earlier. This study illustrates the utility of INAA for testing hypotheses of prehistoric craft production.     

Neolithic and Bronze-Age Herders of Pupićina Cave,Croatia

Abstract

Pupi?ina Cave (Croatia) preserves an important archaeological sequence spanning 12,000 years. Here we present and discuss the results of extensive excavations in post-Mesolithic deposits.Pupi?ina Cave,located in NE Istria in a region rich in caves and in prehistoric settlement, has well-dated evidence from the Middle Neolithic, Late Neolithic, Middle Bronze Age, Iron Age, and Roman periods. Visitors to the cave in the Middle Neolithic ca. 5500–5000 in calibrated years B.C (cal B.C.) left typical Danilo/Vla?ka pottery and kept herds of sheep and goats during the spring. Mortality profiles suggest that herds were managed for milk production. During the Late Neolithic (ca. 4550–4150 cal B.C.) Hvar pottery appears along with lithic artifacts from great distances (e.g.,Lipari). Herds of sheep and goats were managed for meat as were cattle and pigs. There was a major hiatus in occupation between the Late Neolithic and the Middle Bronze Age. Middle Bronze Age (ca. 1775–1400 cal B.C.) deposits are found only in one large pit. Pottery is dominated by drinking vessels, and faunal use is the same as in the Late Neolithic. The cave was used primarily as an animal pen during the Iron Age (1st millennium B.C.).     

PLAIN POTTERY AND SOCIAL LANDSCAPES: REINTERPRETING THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CERAMIC PROVENANCE IN THE NEOLITHIC

This paper focuses on plain, stylistically unvaried pottery from three Late Neolithic sites from the Mondego Plateau, Portugal, and investigates ceramic production and exchange among small‐scale prehistoric societies by means of thin‐section petrography and chemical analysis (INAA). The results show that the majority of the pottery was made with widely available, granite‐derived sedimentary clays, but petrographic differences between fabrics indicate collection at multiple locations within these deposits. Variation in chemical composition is consistent with site‐specific sourcing areas, while comparison with data from earlier sites in the Mondego and surrounding mountains suggests that such sources were geographically restricted within the plateau. In contrast, the small percentage of vessels produced with residual clays of metamorphic and intermediate igneous origin, which outcrop over 10 km and 30 km from the archaeological sites, demonstrates that plain pottery did circulate during the Neolithic beyond the funerary sphere. This is the product of the routines of mobility and social networks of Neolithic groups across the wider landscape, which involved the exchange of ‘mundane’ vessels. Finally, the study demonstrates that micro‐regional provenance studies can provide significant insights into prehistoric social landscapes if the data are interrogated beyond simplistic classifications of local and non‐local.     

Bitumen in Early Ceramic Art: Bitumen‐Painted Ceramics From Late Neolithic Tell Sabi Abyad (Syria)*

The paper presents the results of a chemical analysis of black pigment used to decorate pottery from Late Neolithic Tell Sabi Abyad, northern Syria (c. 6100 cal bc ). The pigment appears to be bitumen. A comparison with known reference samples from modern locations of bituminous sources in the Near East suggests that the bitumen used to paint ceramics at Tell Sabi Abyad came from at least two different source areas in northern Iraq. The bitumen‐painted ceramics at Tell Sabi Abyad represent the earliest evidence attested so far of bitumen used as a pigment for pottery decoration.     

Portuguese Blue‐on‐Blue 16th–17th Century Pottery

Blue‐on‐blue (‘berettino’) sherds have appeared in numerous production and consumption archaeological excavations in Lisbon and other archaeological sites in Portugal (dated from the mid‐16th century to the beginning of the 17th century). The abundance of this interesting faience led us to compare it with similar pottery from other well‐known production centres in Italy, namely Liguria (Savona and Albisola), Spain (the Triana kilns) and the Low Countries. Differences in the diffraction patterns of the sherds' pastes from the four countries were observed. In most samples, cobalt blue silicate (cobalt olivine) was identified in the dark blue or light blue glazes through the use of micro‐Raman spectroscopy and diffuse reflectance spectra. A remarkable difference in the calcite contents of the Lisbon and Seville pottery sherds was observed, in accordance with previous observations of high calcite contents of Seville ceramics. A comparison was also made for all of the blue‐on‐blue sherds studied here with many other 16th–17th century sherds from Lisbon using bivariate plots of K/Si versus Ca/Si. Lisbon and Seville pottery behave very differently, whereas sherds from Italy and the Low Countries occupy intermediate positions.     

浅析贵州民间砂器工艺特点与重要历史价值

贵州砂器工艺是一项非常有特色的民间传统工艺,它所蕴含的古代文化信息十分丰富。通过对贵州民间砂器制作工艺中成型技术、烧制与鼓风方式等与新石器时代制陶工艺的比较,可看出其基本原理及一些重要工序或器械都直接继承了新石器时代的制陶工艺,或者在原始工艺基础上进行了改进。其中包括一些发明创造体现了山区劳动人民的聪明智慧,反映了人类在生存斗争中的创造能力。贵州砂器工艺的历史价值不可低估,值得保护和研究。     

CLAY RESOURCES AND TECHNICAL CHOICES FOR NEOLITHIC POTTERY (CHALAIN,JURA, FRANCE): CHEMICAL,MINERALOGICAL AND GRAIN‐SIZE ANALYSES*

Many authors have considered pottery manufacturing constraints and sociocultural elements as factors in change in past civilizations over time. The main issue of this research is to better understand the reasons for changes, or choices, in pottery raw materials. The very precise and detailed stratigraphy and cultural succession of occupations is based on dendrochronological data from the lake‐dwelling sites of Chalain (Jura, France). Petrographic, palaeontological and chemical analyses were used to determine the nature and origins of the raw materials used by the Neolithic potters. Stratigraphy and dendrochronological data were used to reconstruct in detail the evolution dynamics of fabric changes. Several raw material sources were identified for many of the pottery groups. Each of them was sampled for qualitative experimental tests of pottery forming. The experimental results show a high variability between the sediments tested. This variability was quantitatively estimated by XRF, XRD, the Rietveld method, calcium carbonate quantification and laser grain‐size analyses of matrices, indirect measures of plasticity. These analytical results allow a better understanding of the differences observed in the experimental tests. On the basis of these experimental and analytical results, changing parameters such as pottery manufacturing constraints, mineralogical characteristics of raw materials and sociocultural factors are considered. In conclusion, all the social and technical parameters, in each archaeological context, must be taken into account for a better understanding of the changes occurring throughout the chronological sequence.     

Keeping an eye on your pots: the provenance of Neolithic ceramics from the Cave of the Cyclops,Youra, Greece

Combined petrographic and chemical analysis of MN and LN ceramics from the Cave of the Cyclops on the island of Youra, Greece, has revealed a compositionally diverse assemblage with a range of different local and off-island sources. Ceramics deposited in Neolithic times on this barren, rocky outpost of the Sporades chain may have originated from a surprising number of possible origins, including from the Plain of Thessaly, Euboea and the volcanic northeast Aegean islands. This picture challenges traditional assumptions about Neolithic pottery production and indicates that significant movement of ceramics was already taking place within the northern Aegean as early as the beginning of the sixth millennium BC. The discovery of a persistent local pottery tradition, that is also found on the neighbouring island of Kyra-Panagia, indicates significant continuity in ceramic technology over some 1500 years.     

Adriatic Neolithic Mortuary Ritual at Grapčeva Cave,Croatia

Abstract

Excavations at Grap?eva Cave in Croatia, a major eastern Adriatic Neolithic site, yielded evidence of ritual activities during the 5th millennium CAL B.C. Structured deposits in the main interior chamber consisted of large burned features containing extremely high frequencies of animal remains and artifacts, including richly decorated Late Neolithic “Hvar-style” pottery, as well as scattered human remains. We argue that Grap?eva was a mortuary ritual site, where feasts, offerings to supernatural powers, and secondary burials took place. At Grapc?eva memories were produced and maintained at a time when group histories and genealogies were gaining importance among the newly settled Neolithic food producers of the Adriatic.     

A Study Of The Firing Technique Of Pottery From Kaman‐Kalehöyük,Turkey, by Synchrotron Radiation‐Induced Fluorescence X‐Ray Absorption Near‐Edge Structure (Xanes) Analysis*

Fe K‐XANES spectra of a series of pottery sherds excavated from the archaeological site of Kaman‐Kalehöyük, Turkey, were measured to reveal the firing technique of the pottery. The analysis disclosed relationships among the chemical form of the iron, the firing conditions and the colour of the pottery. The pottery referred to as ‘Grey Ware’ found at this site was classified into two groups according to the chemical form of the iron. Also, it was revealed that the Iron Age pottery referred to as ‘Cream Ware’ was produced first under reducing conditions, and then fired under oxidizing conditions.     

Early Specialized Production? A Chalcolithic Stone Bracelet Workshop at Kanlitaş, Turkey

An assemblage of marble bracelets, at various stages of manufacture, recovered during surface survey of the site of Kanl?ta? in Turkey, indicates that there was specialized production activity at the site during the Chalcolithic period. In this article we present the assemblage, evidence about material procurement, technology and manufacturing processes. We discuss the significance of the assemblage in relation to other sites in the area and as an example of production intended for inter‐site trade or exchange. We also address the wider issues of both the production of stone bracelets as a widespread practice in Anatolia from the Neolithic onwards, and the phenomenon of early specialized production.     

Relations of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers of Pomerania (Poland) with Neolithic cultures of central Europe

Abstract

The appearance of the first farming groups on the North European Plain was the turning point for the Mesolithic foragers who had inhabited that region for almost 7000 years. Interrelations between these two very different communities are fascinating for archaeologists interested in the northern European Stone Age. Research at D?bki in Poland provides elements for a discussion of the Neolithic transformation along the southern Baltic coast. Pottery from the regions inhabited by Danubian societies has been found in a hunting-gathering context (), a fact that sheds light on relations between local Late Mesolithic communities and early farmers. Imports from the Linear Pottery Culture, the Stroked Pottery Culture, the Lengyel Culture, and the Ertebølle Culture are found associated with Late Mesolithic layers, while pottery of the Bodrogkeresztúr Culture is related with the local Funnel Beaker settlement. This imported pottery reflects long lasting contacts between Mesolithic and those Neolithic communities that promoted the neolithization of the coastal region.