Development of ceramic production in the Kur River Basin (Fars, Iran) during the Neolithic. A compositional and technological approach using X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy and thin section petrography

Abstract

This study aims to characterize the Neolithic ceramics (Mushki, Bashi and Jari wares) of the Kur River Basin and reconstruct the origin of the raw materials and manufacturing technology. Neolithic ceramics from thirteen different sites have been studied with handheld X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (hXRF) and thin section petrography. The geochemical signature of these ceramics was defined and four compositional groups were determined. The variation in these compositional groups most likely relates to the ceramic wares for the Mushki and Bashi ceramics and to the site or group of sites for the Jari ceramics. Additionally, sediment samples were studied with hXRF demonstrating the variability in the geochemistry of the area. To determine the composition of the slips used for Bashi and Jari ceramics and to compare them with the inner fabric of the vessels, μXRF spectroscopy was applied. The combination of these archaeometrical techniques indicated the use of unaltered, fine-grained and mainly alluvial clays without the addition of temper (except for chaff) for the production of the three studied wares and the use of different clay types through the Neolithic in the Kur River Basin.

Ceramic Production in the Kur River Basin (Fars, Iran) During the Middle to Late Second Millennium bce: A Geochemical and Technological Characterization

“…More detailed information about these clay samples and the hXRF results have recently been published in Pincé et al . (). Here, the compositions of the clay samples are compared with the compositions of the ceramics to detect if similarities in the elemental compositions of the ceramics and clays from different parts of the region are present that might assist in provenance determinations or at least identify generally used clay types.…”

“…Some Shogha and Taimuran pottery have compositions similar to those of the colluvial clays, but most Shogha–Taimuran ceramics show no match, with the analysed clay samples opposed to the ceramics from the Neolithic period in this region (Pincé et al . ).…”

Ceramic comales at the Barillas site (cal 1255–1390 CE), central Nicaragua: Defining a local technical tradition of griddle manufacture

“…The portable and non-destructive nature of the instrumentation is a major advantage for further field studies with a suitable reference framework in place, however, data analysis needs to be carefully controlled and cautiously interpreted because p-XRF provides semi-quantitative data and it has been the scope of numerous research efforts to ensure reliable data [27,28,29,30,31,32]. In this research, chemical analysis was carried out by p-XRF, which has been used as an explorative and especially non-destructive technique for provenance studies [27].…”

Geochemical analyses result of prehistoric pottery from the site of Tol-e Kamin (Fars, Iran) by pXRF

“…As a second step, it was intended to define to what extent archaeological periods overlapped with geochemical clusters for further classification studies. Few previous archaeometrical studies on ceramic in the region were carried out either on archaeological periods across different sites (Blackman 1988;Pincé et al 2016Pincé et al , 2018Pincé et al , 2019 or on individual periods at one or more sites (Alden and Minc 2016;Blackman 1981). In this study, pottery samples from several archaeological periods collected at the site of Tol-e Kamin are studied, in order to provide a better understanding of the diachronic dynamics of geochemical change in ceramics from the Kur River Basin (hereafter KRB).…”