During the Fall 2015 semester, I was given an incredible opportunity through my affiliation with the Laboratory for Traditional Technology. Dr. Hasaki asked me if I would be interested in working with Cynthia Jones, a local potter here in Tucson and an alumna and friend of the University of Arizona. As an archaeologist whose primary interest is prehistoric ceramic analysis, I welcomed the chance to familiarize myself with pre-wheel pottery techniques. Cynthia and I met weekly in the lab and began to develop a few basic skills that I would need in order to eventually do some true experimental archaeology in the coming semester.
The first skill that I focused on was the pinch technique. In this process, the potter makes a sphere out of a handful of clay. This is done by holding the clay in one hand and firmly striking the clay with the other in order to push air out of the clay. If air pockets are left in the clay, the vessel may explode when fired into its final form. After making a ball, the potter drives a thumb down into the clay while using the thumb and forefinger to pinch at regular intervals. This creates a basic yet beautifully shaped bowl or cup. This process is repeated three to four times. Afterwards, the vessel is allowed to dry for a few days at which point it is polished internally and externally in a process called burnishing. This gives the vessel a smoother surface both inside and out.
I then moved to what is called wedging. This skill is a requirement of all potters and is the most basic step of clay preparation for throwing. At this point, I was already beginning to enjoy making pottery, and wedging brought me even deeper into the process. The technique that I was best equipped to apply drew on my experiences as a baker and bread maker. Holding the clay on a flat surface between my hands, I kneaded the clay like dough, homogenizing it while also pushing air pockets out of it. After this, the clay could be shaped into rectangles that I could cut with string in order to use in the pottery technique described below.
The third and final skill that I learned with Cynthia was the coil method. In this process, wedged clay is cut into strips that are then rolled out evenly and placed in a circular fashion. They are joined by incising the strips on top and bottom and coating them with a mixture of clay, water, and vinegar called slip. These coils are then joined with a flat tool made of wood or stone and allowed to dry a little before more coils are applied. This resulted in a much larger vessel than the pinch technique was able to produce.
The skills I learned with Cynthia allowed me to develop a basic understanding of the conditions that a potter would have been working under in an environment without the wheel. My own research will focus on a period in Greek history during which the wheel was not yet in use. This exposure gives me a tactile understanding of the material that I am looking at for my Master’s as well as my doctoral research. It will also allow me in the coming semesters to perform experimental archaeology research in order to replicate vessel shapes and the conditions in which they were made.
