Beginning this October, a new thematic series will feature as part of the PCMA UW seminar: “Pot Talks – A Multidisciplinary Approach to Ceramics from Africa and Beyond”. The series is organized by Dr. Katarzyna de Lellis-Danys from the PCMA UW Department of African Studies and the National Museum in Warsaw.
The lecture series will cover topics related to multidisciplinary pottery research that will allow participants to exchange experiences with colleagues working in different parts of Africa and beyond. Areas of interest include the social and economic impact of ceramics on ancient populations, archaeometric research, and methodology, including data collection and management.
The meetings will be based on building a platform among participants to facilitate knowledge exchange and multidimensional imaging of the landscape of the African past through ceramic research.
During the first meeting, Dr. Katarzyna de Lellis-Danys and Dr. Lorenzo de Lellis (PCMA UW) will present a paper: “Quantitative, diachronic and spatial perspectives of the pottery life in the households of Old Dongola (Sudan).”
Abstract: “The comprehensive research program on the liminal phases between the Late Christian and Islamic periods of Old Dongola (Sudan) thanks to the ERC Starting Grant ‘UMMA’ from the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology University of Warsaw included excavations of the large piece of the city among other project activities. It resulted in a massive corpus of data, including over 145,000 fragments of pottery, dated to the 14th–18th centuries CE, and presented a unique opportunity to apply quantitative, diachronic, and spatial analysis on a large scale. Various classes of vessels such as bowls, plates, jars, and incense burners provided insights into the daily life of Old Dongola’s population.
This paper presents a diachronic and spatial perspective of the ceramic finds, based on the quantitative analysis of the assemblages, their relationship to the spatial context, and their variability through time. Issues of multifunctionality and association between pottery classes and with other types of artefacts, distribution, seriation, and composition of the assemblages are here discussed to offer a contextualized overview of the life cycle of the pottery in Old Dongola, from production to discard.”
The seminar will be held online on Thursday, October 5th at 2 pm GMT+2 on the Zoom platform.
To receive the link, please write to pcma@uw.edu.pl