S p e c i a l i s t p r o d u c t i o n o n a l a r g e r s c a l e i s s e e n f r o m a r o u n d
the mid-second millennium b.c.e. in the eastern Mediterra-
nean, for example in Minoan Crete, Mycenaean Greece, and
Cyprus. Such production was not only for local elite use but
also for exchange or trade: sophisticated networks of contacts
linked the east Mediterranean with other parts of the Medi-
terranean and with the Near East, ensuring the fl ow of many
kinds of goods. Techniques of pot building included the use
of the potter’s wheel, oft en in conjunction with coil building
or other methods. In coil building, rolled lengths of clay are
formed into rings, one atop the other.
Th e trend toward large-scale, specialist production
reached its peak during the fi rst millennium b.c.e. in the
form of Etruscan, Greek, and Roman pottery. Trade and oth-
er mechanisms took Greek and Roman pottery far from its
places of manufacture, including into the hands of the elite
in other parts of Europe. Local potters then emulated the so-
phisticated techniques used to make these imported pieces.
Th is was how the technique of “throwing” pottery on a wheel
spread across parts of Europe around 500 b.c.e.
Modern analytical techniques reveal much about the
manufacturing methods, function, origin, and signifi cance
of prehistoric European pottery. Advances in the study of pot
contents have allowed archaeologists to detect invisible traces
of dairy products, meat, fi sh, resins, oils, and even the remains
of cabbage or related plants. Th is technique is shedding im-
portant new light on the diet and methods of food prepara-
tion of ancient Europeans. In Britain it has revealed the use of
“secondary” products such as milk around 3900–3500 b.c.e.,
much earlier than previously suspected. It has also shown
that in England and Wales around 3000–2500 b.c.e. certain
kinds of pots seem to have been preferred for cooking pork,
while others were used for cooking beef.
Analytical techniques can also provide details about
decoration and other surface treatments, ranging from what
fi bers made up the cords that were impressed into the surface
of a pot to detailing methods of coating used to produce a
specifi c surface color or texture. Analysis of the stone frag-
ments employed as fi ller to stop rapid-fi red vessels from ex-
ploding during fi ring can reveal whether pottery production
was locally based or not. Th is technique has shown that the
particularly good clays of the Lizard Peninsula in southwest
England were used to make pottery that then traveled long
distances during the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. We can also
gain insights into prehistoric European belief systems by con-
sidering the kinds of objects made (for example, fi gurines)
and the methods of manufacture (such as the use of recycled
ancestral vessels as fi ller in new pots).
GREECE
BY SPYROS SIROPOULOS
Pottery surpassed its practical uses and became an art in
Greece in the Bronze Age (1500–1050 b.c.e.), but there are
signs that clay was worked fi ve thousand years earlier. Ar-
chaeological excavations have come up with artifacts that
indicate experimentation with clay as early as the Neolithic
Period, between 6800 and 6500 b.c.e., though the general use
of clay is in dispute.
Extensive manufacture and use of clay vessels charac-
terize the Neolithic Period from 7000 to 5800 b.c.e. Decora-
tion is very simple, mostly consisting of geometric forms in
red (lines and triangles) incised on the surface of the pots,
which oft en mimic objects such as reed baskets and leather
sacks. Techniques and patterns varied greatly in diff erent ar-
eas of Greece. In Th essaly and western Macedonia pots were
decorated with human forms. On mainland Greece pots with
incisions of white material were discovered. Monochrome
ceramics prevailed in the Peloponnese, and decoration was
not important. In Crete ceramics with incised and dotted
decorations were found, while in western Greece there are
indications of a connection with the Adriatic thanks to the
presence of impressed ceramics, decorated with a kind of
stamp. Stamping was done by using nails, seashells, or other
objects to imprint a design on the surface of the pot, which
was of very simple shape.
By 3000 b.c.e. bronze began to be used in Greece. Two
great civilizations developed, one on the island of Crete,
called the Minoan (aft er the mythical king Minos), and theTerra-cotta statuette of a lady in a swing, from Agia Triada, Herakleion
(Alison Frantz Photographic Collection, American School of Classical Studies
at Athens)182 ceramics and pottery: Greece