Ceramics and Society: A Technological Approach to Archaeological Assemblages, Hardcover

Pottery is the most ubiquitous find in most historical archaeological excavations and serves as the basis for much research in the discipline. But it is not only its frequency that makes it a prime dataset for such research, it is also that pottery embeds many dimensions of the human experience, ranging from the purely technical to the eminently symbolic.

The aim of this book is to provide a cutting-edge theoretical and methodological framework, as well as a practical guide, for archaeologists, students and researchers to study ceramic assemblages. As opposed to the conventional typological approach, which focuses on vessel shape and assumed function with the main goal of establishing a chronological sequence, the proposed framework is based on the technological approach. Such an approach utilizes the concept of cha ne op ratoire, which is geared to an anthropological interpretation of archaeological objects.

The author offers a sound theoretical background accompanied by an original research strategy whose presentation is at the heart of this book. This research strategy is presented in successive chapters that are geared to explain not only how to study archaeological assemblages, but also why the proposed methods are essential for achieving ambitious interpretive goals.

In the heated debate on the equation stating that "pots equal people", which is a rather fuzzy reference to assumed relationships between (mostly) ethnic groups and pottery, technology enables us to propose with conviction the equation "pots equal potters". In this way, a well-founded history of potters is able to achieve a much better cultural and anthropological understanding of ancient societies.​

About the Author

Valentine Roux is Director of Research at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS, France). Her work combines ethnoarchaeology in India and archaeology in the Near East with the aim of highlighting the anthropological regularities underlying the evolutionary trajectories of ancient technological traditions. Much of her research has been devoted to the development of reference frameworks, whether about the diagnostic attributes of manufacturing techniques, their properties, the quantification of their constitutive components, the cognitive and motor skills involved, or, more recently, about the conditions favorable to their diffusion. These frames of reference were built during two stages: a first stage where regularities were highlighted, a second stage where the mechanisms that found them were studied. During this second stage, there is always a change of scale and need for interdisciplinary research which explains her numerous collaborations with researchers in geosciences, economy, psychology and sociology. At the same time, the application of anthropological regularities to the archaeological assemblages of the ancient Near East has necessitated the development of new theoretical and methodological frameworks that led her to renew, more particularly, the ceramic technological approach. She was rewarded in 2015 with the CNRS silver medal and in 2016 with the Legion d'Honneur under the Ministry of Scientific Research.