EAA 2023: Abstract

This paper explores the social role of pottery breakage and, more importantly, how these phenomena effectively shape domestic activities. Pottery breakage has been normally understood in a linear fashion. That is, it is a process that happens after using vessels for a certain time and then these are either reused in some way or discarded. While this can certainly be the case sometimes, there is more to be understood about how breakage develops and what is done with the fragments produced. The aim of this paper is to illustrate how breakage modifies human behaviour in various ways throughout object’s trajectories, from how we handle or observe objects that appear to be breaking to what we effectively do with the pieces. For this task, a first step taken in this paper is to follow a theory of breakage that understands these phenomena as constantly unfolding, rather than instantaneous events, which ultimately contributes to a broader understanding of the role pottery fragments can have in social practices. A series of methods are then presented for analysing the mechanical behaviour of ceramics, which informs us of how pots actually break, as well as sherd use-wear traces that indicate how fragments are reintegrated in specific human activities. These methods were applied to study potsherds from Early Neolithic pits and occupation layers in Körös-Criș settlements in the Upper Tisza/Tisa Basin, and unveiled: (1) that Körös-Criș organic-tempered ceramic replicas exhibit crack deflection and bridging mechanisms that increase its toughness (i.e. a ‘cracking technology’), and (2) that potsherds had important roles in pottery manufacture and potentially in cooking activities.

Pottery, Breakage, Neolithic, Use-wear Analysis, Materials Science, Archaeological Theory

Oral presentation

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Bruno Vindrola-Padrós¹