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Byzantine and Allied Pottery: A Contribution by Chemical Analysis to Problems of Origin and Distribution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2013

A. H. S. Megaw  and
R. E. Jones
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Abstract

Analyses are given of the clay composition of kiln waste from some production sites, and of excavated sherds of some distinctive wares, as a contribution to a possible archive aimed at localizing the origins of different classes of pottery found in archaeological contexts, and at clarifying trade patterns.

Type
Research Article
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 78 , November 1983 , pp. 235 - 263
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1983

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References

Abbreviations

Bakirtzi Bakirtzis, Ch., ‘Didymoteichon: un centre de céramique postbyzantine’, Balkan Studies 21 (1980) 147–53.Google Scholar

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1 BP 2.

2 For a preliminary report see Megaw, A. H. S. and Jones, R. E., ‘Spectrographic Analyses of Byzantine and Allied Pottery’, Actes XVIe CIEB (Vienna 1981) (forthcoming).Google Scholar

3 The short list of recorded Byzantine kilns given by Cook, R. M. (BSA 56 (1961) 64 ff.)Google Scholar can now be expanded. Notable are those at Lefkadia, (PAE (1959) 87)Google Scholar and Trikala, (A. Delt 20 (1965)Google ScholarChron. 315–16), in addition to the three in which our Batches A, F, and H(2) originated.

4 BP 7 ff.

5 Hayes, J. W. in Colloques Internationaux du CNRS No. 578Google Scholar: Salamine de Chypre. Histoire ei Archéologie (1978) 375–80 fig. 6.

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15 Fragments have been seen (by Megaw) among the unpublished pottery, destined for the Haaretz Museum in Tel-Aviv, from the ruined manor Kh. Mazra'a, near the coast north of Someleria.

16 BP 10 ff. fig. 8.

17 We are indebted to Dr. V. Karageorghis for permission to analyse this selection, and to Mr. M. Loulloupis for relevant information.

18 CMGP 9 Group VII pl. viii 47 58.

19 CMGP 10 Group VIIIB.

20 Similar to Taylor fig. 11.

21 Hadjisavvas, S., ‘An Archaeological Survey of Paphos’, RDAC 1977 227.Google Scholar Subsequently, wasters have been found at Ayia Marina itself (information from Franz Maier).

22 CMGP 5 fig. 2.

23 Dikigoropoulos and Megaw 79–80.

24 BP 49.

25 Peschlow 380 ff.

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28 Bakirtzis 148 ff.

29 Catling 52 and fig. 31.

30 Rudolf 304 n. 19.

31 Rudolf 304 n. 23.

32 Hood, M. S. F., BSA 65 (1970) 37–45.Google Scholar

33 Rudolf fig. 3.

34 Rudolf 304 n. 23.

35 Rudolf 303 ff.

36 Megaw, A. H. S., ‘Supplementary Excavations on a Castle Site at Paphos, Cyprus, 1970–71’, DOP 26 (1972) 322–43Google Scholar and id., ‘Saranda Kolones, 1981’, RDAC 1982 210–16.

37 BP 105.

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40 Frantz fig. 32 A65, A79; fig. 33 C1, C3, and C5.

41 Kritsas, op. cit. (n. 39) 180.

42 Frantz 435–6.

43 Frantz 465 fig. 30 E2.

44 See, for example, Catling, et al., BSA 75 (1980) 49–113Google Scholar and Jones, R. E. and Mee, C. B., JFA 5 (1978) 461–74.Google Scholar

45 See, for example, Lazzarini, L. et al. , ‘Chemical, Minera logical and Moessbauer Studies of Venetian and Paduan Renaissance Sgraffito Ceramics’, Archaeometry 22 (1980) 57–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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47 R. E. Jones, Greek and Cypriot Pottery: a Review of Scientific Studies, forthcoming.

48 At least 150 mg in the case of the coarse wares, especially the Dhiorios batch.

49 A full account of both the precision and accuracy of the analytical procedure using optical emission spectroscopy is given by Jones, op. cit. (n. 47).

50 This matter is discussed in detail by Jones, op. cit. (n. 47).

51 The composition characteristics of the groups presented by the authors, op. cit. (n. 2), were based on calculations of the preliminary data. Small discrepancies are to be found between the two data sets.

52 The dispersions of the other major and minor, but not the trace, element contents are also relatively high, but less so than that of Mg.

53 Picon, M., ‘Remarques préliminaires sur deux types d'altération de la composition chimique des céramiques au cours du temps’, Figlina 1 (1976)Google Scholar (Documents du Laboratoire de céramologie de Lyon).

54 These were analysed in connection with a study of Corinthian transport amphorae in collaboration with Drs. C. G. Koehler, A. Kostikas, and A. Simopoulos.

55 See Mountjoy, et al., BSA 73 (1978) 159ff.Google Scholar

56 We are grateful to Mile D. Kassab for supplying samples of these clays. Analysis at the Research Laboratory for Archaeology at Oxford of a white clay used by potters today at Iznik revealed that, unlike the Bosphorus clay, it was highly calcareous (H. Hatcher, personal communication). See n. 57.

57 We may note some analyses of the White Ware reported by Rice, Talbot in Studies in Islamic Art and Architecture in Honour of K. A. C. Creswell (Cairo 1965) 197 n. 4.Google Scholar The mineralogical composition of the best polychrome White Ware (his type 2) was given as: much quartz, a little calcite, a little γ-Al2O3, a little calcium aluminate, and a little feldspar or anorthite. That of his type 1 (pink or buff body, very hard) was: much quartz, some mica, possibly a little γ-Al2O3. He also reported that Iznik 16th- cent. pottery was clearly different from the White Ware since it contained much quartz, a little crystobalite, and a little diopside (198 n. 4).

58 Chemical and petrological analyses of pottery from the cave have been carried out in collaboration with Dr. K. D. Vitelli, Mrs. Ph. Pomoni, and Dr. V. Perdikatsis.

59 Johnston, A. W. and Jones, R. E., ‘The SOS Amphora’, BSA 73 (1978) 103–41.Google Scholar

60 Prag et al., op. cit. (n. 46) Table 6.

61 The Fitch Laboratory's corpus of Attic pottery ranging in date from the Mycenaean period to the present material of the 12th cent. A.D. reveals small but discernible variations in composition, reflecting the use of different clays and clay mixes in the Athens region as functions of time and type of vessel. The impressive results obtained in an analytical programme carried out at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in collaboration with Mrs. D. Thompson on material of Proto geometric to Hellenistic date are highly pertinent to this issue; an account of this work was given by D. Filli ères at the Archaeometry Symposium in Brookhaven in 1981.

62 An exposition of discriminant analysis in its application to provenance studies of pottery in the Aegean is given by Cherry in Mountjoy et al, op. cit. (n. 55) and in Catling et al., op. cit. (n. 44). A more general account is provided by Pollard in Chapter 2 of Jones, op. cit. (n. 47). The BMDP7M stepwise discriminant analysis programme was used on the Oxford University Computing Service's ICL 2980 computer.

63 See Catling et al., op. cit. (n. 44) Table 4.

64 From Prag et al., op. cit. (n. 46) Table 6.

65 Tréziny, H. and Jones, R. E., MEFRA 91 (1979) 58–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

66 Pringle, D., ‘The Medieval Pottery of Palestine and Transjordan (AD 636–1500): an Introduction, Gazetteer and Bibliography’, Medieval Ceramics (Bulletin of the Medieval Pottery Research Group) (1981) 45.Google Scholar

67 Megaw 1968 87.

68 Megaw 1975.

69 Maier, F. G., RDAC 1979 pl. xvii 2.Google Scholar