Pottery
Pottery has had many uses over the years. Humans developed it for
utilitarian purposes. Then they made it more durable and put neat designs on
it. After thousands of years, archaeologists came to love pottery because it can
tell so much about cultures and how they relate to one another over time. Plus
pottery looks cool. Archaeologists love pottery because it is useful in the dating
and understanding of sites and trade networks. Pottery can also be used to tell
what cultures might have been interacting with one another.
The oldest known examples of pottery vessels show up in the
archaeological record about 18,300 to 15,430 years ago at the Yuchanyan site
in the Hunan Province of China (Cohen). The pottery sherds found at the
Yuchanyan site were very coarse, soft, low fired, and included many inclusions
of small pebbles (Cohen). Pottery is thought to originate in East Asia. There is
much debate on whether pottery originates in East Asia (Palmer). Pottery has
many functions connected with cooking, transport, storage, art, and burial.
Some of the sherds found at Yuchanyan were fitted together to form a conical
cauldron (Palmer). The designs on pottery evolve over time and differ from
culture to culture. Jomon pottery from Japan favor cord patterns, some of the
pottery was for utilitarian uses like cooking and storage while some was
ceremonial in nature (Scarre, 258-260).
Pottery can help date a feature, identify regional trade networks, and
identify functions of sites and structures. As was stated before, pottery styles
change from culture to culture and evolve over time. An archaeologist can get a
date for a site relative to what sort of structure a pot has, how it was
constructed, fired, and how it is decorated (Wilreker). For instance, if there is a
site where there is an artifact that cannot be dated settled between a
stratigraphic layer including a pottery sherd that can be dated to 3,000 years
ago and a stratigraphic layer including a pot sherd datable back to 5,000 years
ago then the un-datable artifact falls somewhere in between 3,000 and 5,000
years ago. Pots can also be used to trace trade networks. Pottery can be
identified by construction, shape, and decoration (Wilreker). If a style of pottery
that is known to originate in Northern Japan six thousand years ago is found
on sites in Southern Japan and Eastern Korea, and pottery known to originate
in Eastern Korea found at sites in Southern Japan and Northern Japan, it can
be seen that there must have been a trade network between these places
around that time. The designs on pottery can also show cultural values and the
trade of ideas between cultures. Pottery is also helpful in identifying the uses of
sites and structures. A large cache of pottery with food remains still inside of
the pots is found in a depression in the ground at a site that was probably a
dwelling. The cluster of pottery suggests that the depression in the ground was
used as a storage space. Pottery situated in relation to features of a site can
shed some light on what possibly use people might have used the feature for.
The Ban Kao culture in Thailand had some distinctive pots with tripod
legs (Scarre, 252-254). Like many cultures in East Asia, the Ban Kao culture
buried their dead with grave goods including pottery (Scarre, 252-254). The
tripod pottery of this area is visually similar to tripod pottery found in the
Pelligang culture in China (Scarre, 238-239 252-254). The Ban Kao tripod
pottery has more prominent tripod legs than the example of the Pelligang tripod
pottery does, but they also have similar neck pieces. From these observances
regarding the pottery of these two cultures it could be inferred that there was
trade or contact of some form between these two cultures, and probably with
the cultures located in the geographic areas between the two cultures.
The Yuchanyan pottery is the oldest example of an extremely important
part of human culture. Pottery can be used to identify cultures at different time
periods, as well as tell who might have been trading or interacting with whom,
as is illustrated by the tripod pottery of the Ban Kao culture and the Pelligang
culture. Pottery has been very important throughout human history and helps
give archaeologists insight into culture and relationships between cultures.
Bibliography
Cohen, David J. “Yuchanyan and the World’s Oldest Pottery.” The
International Center for East Asian Archaeology and Cultural History.
June 3, 2009. Boston University. May 17, 2011. Web.
Palmer, Jason. “’Oldest Pottery’ found in China.” BBC News. June 1,
BBC. May 17, 2011. Web.
2009.
Scarre, Chris. The Human Past. 2nd edition. London: Thames & Hudson
2009. 238-239,252-254,258-260. Print.
Ltd.,
Wilreker, Benjamin. College of Southern Nevada. CSN Building K, rm.
Las Vegas, NV. Lecture.
248,