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XII/2/2021
INTERDISCIPLINARIA ARCHAEOLOGICA
NATURAL SCIENCES IN ARCHAEOLOGY
homepage: http://www.iansa.eu
A Return to the Wheel: Rethinking Experimental Methodologies
for the Study of the Potter’s Wheel
Chase A. M. Minos
1*
1
The Cyprus Institute, Science and Technology in Archaeology Research Centre (STARC), Athalassa Campus, 20 Konstantinou Kavaf Street, 2121,
Aglantzia, Nicosia, Cyprus
1. Introduction
Recent scholarship concerning the analysis of pottery-
forming techniques has argued that the tool, in this case
the potter’s wheel, is not a signifcant variable afecting
the results of analyses on macroscopic traces. However,
in the words of Van der Leeuw (1993, p.240), “techniques
cannot be studied in isolation, but should [rather] be seen as
the arena of mediation between what is materially possible
or impossible”. Therefore, any investigation into wheel-
making techniques cannot exist without analysing the wheel:
including its mechanical, physical, and even experiential
properties.
For my research, experimental archaeology was combined
with the analytical tool of
chaîne opératoire
to interpret the
potter’s wheel and conical cups from Crete during the Middle
to Late Bronze Age when the wheel was introduced, and the
technology developed (c. 2200 to 1500 BCE). The
chaîne
opératoire
approach was utilised in order to understand and
isolate making techniques on the wheel in the production
sequence and subsequently for investigating the choices
made in terms of techniques and wheels (Dobres, 2000; van
der Leeuw, 1993; Roux, 2019). This was then teamed with
an archaeological experiment aimed at assessing the variable
of the wheel type. Situated between actualistic and scientistic
(Outram, 2008), the experiment was designed to incorporate
accurate materials (clay) with hypothesised techniques, and
pottery wheels propelled by mechanical, electronic or human
input.
The conical cup was chosen as the ideal vessel as it was
perhaps the most ubiquitous pot from the Bronze Age on
Crete, found in a wide range of contexts from “palaces”
to domestic, funerary and ritual spaces (Gillis, 1990a and
1990b). Moreover, their simple, open shape and small size
means that they require fewer gestures for forming and
shaping on the wheel than a taller or closed shape. Their
production also embodies the major technological and
societal changes happening during the Bronze Age, such
as urbanisation and craft specialization (Schoep, 2004,
p.262; 2006, p.54; Tomkins and Schoep, 2012, p.6; Weiner,
2011; Hamilakis and Sherratt, 2012; Choleva, 2012; 2018;
Christakis, 1996). As such an unassuming vessel type in terms
of aesthetics and manufacture, the fact that this complex and
highly specialised technology of wheel-making technology
Volume XII ● Issue 2/2021 ● Pages 127–142
*Corresponding author. E-mail: chase.minos@outlook.com
ARTICLE INFO
Article history:
Received: 1
st
February 2021
Accepted: 4
th
November 2021
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.24916/iansa.2021.2.2
Keywords:
potter’s wheel
Bronze Age
Crete
experimental archaeology
chaîne opératoire
ABSTRACT
Research into the study of wheel-making techniques has grown, but studies of the tool or the wheel
and its properties have remained understudied or considered insignifcant until recently. In order to
develop this research, the wheel and its practicalities, such as the physics, should be incorporated more
into research of making techniques. Through the application of
chaîne opératoire
and experimental
archaeology, this research questioned whether diferent wheel types produce diferent macroscopic
traces on pots produced by the same technique. There are several results presented here that can shed
light on the way archaeologists should investigate and understand early wheel potting, in particular the
physics of rotation, which has received minimal attention as a result of a predominance for researching
techniques over the tool (the wheel). The application of this research is used to better understand
pottery and potter’s wheels from their adoption and development during the Middle Bronze Age on
Crete, c. 2000 to 1500 BCE. A revision of experimental work and methodologies is combined with
archaeological experimentation in order to help clarify not only how tools such as the wheel were used
but subsequently what roles these craftworkers played in past societies.
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IANSA 2021 ● XII/2 ● 127–142
Chase A. M. Minos: A Return to the Wheel: Rethinking Experimental Methodologies for the Study of the Potter’s Wheel
128
trickled down to or, perhaps, began with the manufacture of
these vessels is a testament to their importance.
Observation of macroscopic traces from replica pots
produced by the author were used to help inform interpretation
of how conical cups of a specifc period (Late Minoan IA,
c. 1500 BCE) from an assemblage in the South Corridor of
the Minoan Unexplored Mansion (MUM) in Knossos, were
manufactured on the wheel (Popham, 1984a; Figure 1).
The MUM is a large complex located west of the palace of
Knossos. Once connected to the Little Palace via a bridge
(Hatzaki, 2005), the MUM yielded a number of fnds related
to industrial activities, including incredibly fne pottery,
potter’s wheels, as well as large amounts of bronze working
materials (Popham, 1984; Christakis, 2019). This particular
assemblage contains pottery dating to the Late Minoan IA of
Bronze Age Crete, during which conical cups had reached
a standardisation in shape, size and manufacture that was not
seen in previous phases (Hatzaki, 2007, p.167). The MUM
pottery in general remains heavily selected, and as a result
the conical cups that were chosen to be kept tended to be
complete cups, with only a few being broken.
The experiment presented in this paper was designed to
assess three diferent wheel types following three techniques
that scholars have previously suggested were possibly in
use during the Late Minoan IA period (
cf.
Jefra, 2011).
The method by which a wheel rotates and the mechanical
components which enable rotation can afect traces left on
pottery. While an electric wheel provides stable rotation with
a motor, a kick or stick wheel delivers rotation through non-
motorised means. From this observation, the experiment
was designed to isolate the specifc variables of how non-
motorised wheels rotate and what efects the physics of
their rotation have upon macroscopic traces left on pottery.
The results suggest that the variable of the wheel, and
more specifcally the nature of its rotation, should be more
seriously reconsidered as a factor that afects macroscopic
traces left on pottery.
In this paper I briefy review the current state of knowledge,
highlighting the origins of the disparity between studies of the
technique and tool, and how they have afected scholarship.
Next, I consider the evidence for the wheel on Crete and discuss
their characteristics before detailing the experiment conducted
at the Centre for Experimental Archaeology and Material
Culture (CEAMC) at University College Dublin. A few key
results will be presented and then discussed with aspects of the
wheel that might be considered within the context of Cretan
archaeology, skill from the perspective of the experimenter
and the ancient potter, and pottery technologies.
1.1 The study of wheel techniques and tools
Many of the new methodologies for studying pottery
technology were developed during the 1980s and promoted
the importance of techniques over the tool. They were
founded upon on archaeological and ethnographic research
by scholars such as Anna Shepard (1956), Hélène Balfet,
and others working in places such as Crete (Thrapsano and
Margarites; Franchet, 1917; Xanthoudídes, 1927; Hampe and
Winter, 1962), the Maghreb in North Africa (Balfet, 1965;
1984), the Netherlands (Van der Leeuw, 1976a) Pakistan
(Rye and Evans, 1976) and India (Roux and Corbetta, 1989).
Indeed, Sander Van der Leeuw noted in 1993 (p.243) that
few scholars had conducted comparative research between
forming techniques, with the single exception of Balfet in
1965 and 1984. Yet, it is possible that Van der Leeuw himself
is one of the few scholars of the time to discuss and explore
the mathematics as well as physics of rotation in his
Studies
in the Technology of Ancient Pottery
(1976b)
.
By the later 1980s, this research coalesced into studies
in which the individual potter became the subject of
analysis, and his or her techniques became the variables.