Pottery
My interest in pottery stems from research for my PhD, which looked at pottery production and distribution in the Hunsrück-Eifel Kultur of the German Iron Age.  This project involved making macroscopic fabric descriptions of some of the pottery and subjecting it to thin-section petrographic analysis.

The thin-sections tended to confirm some of the regional groupings which had been suggested by A. Haffner and H.E. Joachim on the basis of pottery decoration.  The scientific work also extended to an examination of the firing temperatures of the pottery.  The results of this work were incorporated into a ‘World System’ model and it was suggested that the Hunsrück-Eifel Kultur (H.E.K.) existed on the edge of a large prestige goods network which developed in Central Europe during the Hallstatt D period, but which was only in its early stages in the H.E.K. when the Hallstatt D network broke down.  It was suggested that this Hallstatt D network had largely been driven by contact with the Classical Greek world, and that Central European raw materials had been traded in exchange for luxury items from the Greek City States and their colonies.

On the collapse of this Greek-led system in Central Europe the H.E.K. was less affected since its involvement in the system was marginal. In the succeeding La Tene A period the peoples of the H.E.K. seem to have traded for Mediterranean goods not with Greece, but over the alps into northern Italy where they were able to obtain Etruscan metalwork and so develop their own prestige goods system – using these precious items as a means of achieving social status in their own community.

This project gave me a background in some aspects of archaeological science, as well as developing my interest in the technology of ceramic production.   During my PhD research I also organised the first of two ethnographic projects at Deir el-Gharbi in Upper Egypt.  Deir el-Gharbi is part of the Ballas industry, a group of pottery workshops which produce large amphora-like vessels using calcareous clay.  In 1984 my colleague, Dr. Helen Patterson, and I spent several weeks studying the organisation of the industry and the details of the production of the vessels.  In 1987 we returned to the village to carry out a more detailed study of the firing of the vessels.  These studies have been valuable in understanding the nature of pottery production in Egypt and, more broadly, elsewhere.

The Ballas industry is based around calcareous, marl, clays but these have a limited occurrence in Egypt and pottery is most commonly made from what Egyptian archaeologists refer to as ‘Nile silt’.  Further ethnoarchaeological work was carried out amongst the Nile silt potters at Deir Mawas in Middle Egypt.  The workshop studied produces a wide range of different vessels, including hand-made water-cooling vessels, wheel made bowls and dishes and children’s toys.  Along with Dr. Willeke Wendrich two video films of the work were produced.

I have also carried out excavations at potter’s workshops at Tell el-Amarna, and undertaken experimental archaeology projects based on the excavated evidence.  One of these reconstructed, at full size, a pottery kiln and fired it to examine how it functioned, whilst another attempted to do the same for a so-called ‘box oven’.  One of my colleagues, Catherine Powell undertook experiments using a replica potter’s wheel of the 18th Dynasty and showed that it served as a true wheel, not merely as a turntable as some had believed.

Relevant Publications: Book chapters (including conference proceedings)