Characterizing Eighteenth Century Technological Changes in Pawnee Pottery

Summary

The pottery produced by the Pawnee of the central Great Plains of North America underwent extensive modification in the eighteenth century. Although twentieth-century archaeologists described the "early" and "late" materials, they did not adequately characterize how Pawnee potters modified their craft in terms of vessel morphology or technological practice, nor did they consider pottery function. Thus, we have no satisfactory account of this change. Situated in the context of technological changes during the contact era, this study uses petrography, vessel morphometrics, pXRF, and FTIR to address how the pottery changed. The analysis reveals that the introduction of metal vessels did not lead to a phase-out of native pottery, but rather that the functions formerly performed by pottery alone were divided between metal and earthenware. The appearance of the material was so markedly different because manufacturing technology and form were modified to facilitate pottery’s revised role in foodways.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• Advances in the Method and Application of Ceramic Petrography: International Perspectives on Key Archaeological Questions Part II

Keywords

Spatial Coverage