Petrographic and Technological Analysis of Ancient Polychrome Ceramics from Upper Madeira River, Amazonia

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Andean and Amazonian Ceramics: Advances in Technological Studies" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Several researchers have been showing that the southwestern Amazon is a center of cultural innovation and diversity in lowlands South America. Archaeological studies carried out in the last decades have also revealed that the region has ancient centers of ceramic production. At the upper Madeira River, southwest Amazonia, one of these occupations is related to the Pocó-Açutuba Tradition, one of the first ceramics in South America with polychromic painting, dating from the fourth millennium BP. At the Teotônio site, upper Madeira River, beside the considerable degree of variation in the temper, smoothing, polishing, and preservation of the sherds, there is also a postdepositional alteration in the layers where this material is found. To clarify this scenario and to propose a technological overview about these archaeological ceramics, this presentation will show data from macroscopic traces of manufacture provided by technological analysis integrated with a petrographic and archaeometric studies of these ceramics. This dataset gives information that allow to establish the technological elements of ceramics and their operative chain, the methods and choices of the potters, and finally, to suggest the different technological assemblages that could represent the identity of potters and their social environment and/or changes over time.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Andean and Amazonian Ceramics: Advances in Technological Studies   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 35986.0