Pottery making in upper Egypt: An ethnoarchaeological study

Major and Trace Element Analysis of Modern Egyptian Pottery

“…Second, by visiting the potter who produces the pot, it is possible to determine the exact recipe for the raw ceramic body used to produce the pot, as well as the potter's specific production sequence, and then to correlate both with the finished fired product. Third, with some notable exceptions (Butzer, 1974;Matson, 1974;Brissaud, 1982;Golvin, Thiriot & Zakariya, 1982;Henein, 1992; and the series on the Ballas Pottery Project: Lacovara, 1985;Nicholson & Patterson, 1985a,b, 1992, comparatively little work has been published on modern traditional Egyptian ceramics, especially from an archaeological perspective. Finally, traditional pottery making in Egypt is a much-reduced and possibly dying art.…”

“…10, 12, 31, 52, 62, 64, 14·9, 51·4; initially 64 and 71 were also placed in this group, but see below). A total of only five specimens in the entire modern corpus appeared to have been made of marl clay: the ballas jar from Upper Egypt (65) with a grey-green fabric (see Lacovara, 1985;Nicholson & Patterson, 1985a,b, 1992, and four examples of ballas jars from the Gerzeh roadside of an orange marl fabric (e.g. 11·3).…”

Looking through pots: recent advances in ceramics X-radiography

“…However, anthropological case studies have shown that this binary classification is a modern construct and does not reflect past reality (Blandino, 2003;Bresenham, 1985;Courty and Roux, 1995;Foster, 1959;Franken and Kalsbeek, 1975;Gelbert, 1999;Mahias, 1993;Miller, 1985;Nicholson and Patterson, 1985;Roux and Courty, 1998;Saraswati and Behura, 1966;van der Leeuw, 1993). Instead, pottery manufacturing techniques should best be visualised as ranging from completely Table 2 Exposure times and kV for clay objects using a Faxitron Cabinet X-ray machine with a 0.5 mm focal spot and 60 cm focus-to-film distance and at 3 mA The kV shown here only present a guide; radiographs should always be taken using the lowest possible kV to improve image contrast.…”

Meaning in the making: The potter’s wheel at Phylakopi, Melos (Greece)

“…With regard to the forming techniques used, modern scholars normally talk in terms of either hand-building techniques or wheel throwing. However, forming techniques are better understood as two points along a spectrum ranging from purely hand-built to purely wheelthrown vessels with most methods lying somewhere in between these extremes or indeed utilising both at diVerent stages of the manufacturing process (Blandino, 2003;Bresenham, 1985;Courty and Roux, 1995;Foster, 1959;Franken and Kalsbeek, 1975;Gelbert, 1999;Mahias, 1993;Miller, 1985;Nicholson and Patterson, 1985;Roux, 2003;Roux and Courty, 1998;Saraswati and Behura, 1966;van der Leeuw, 1993). The fact that a potter may combine diVerent techniques in the making of a single vessel (Saraswati and Behura, 1966, p. 61) and evidence of diVerent potters producing the same vessel type by diVerent methods undermines the functionalist paradigm (Miller, 1985, pp.…”