When faced with an unidentified sherd, there are three primary attributes which can help lead to identification: paste, surface treatment/glaze and decoration. Paste consists of the clay or a mix of clay and any inclusions (temper) that have been used in forming the body of the ceramic.
How do you identify pottery pieces?
A few factors to look out for when figuring out how to identify antique pottery are the weight of the piece, its translucency or resonance. Its easier to figure out the body if the piece is chipped - simply run your finger along the fracture to identify how hard the grain is.
What are pottery sherds?
A definition of sherd, according to Merriam Websters online dictionary, is “a fragment of a pottery vessel found on sites and in refuse deposits where pottery-making peoples have lived.” However, shard is a more generic term for “a piece or fragment of a brittle substance.” In short, sherd (short for potsherd) goes
How do you date pottery Archaeology?
The researchers have developed the first direct method for dating pottery by examining animal fats preserved inside the ceramic walls. Archaeologists have long dated sites by the visual appearance of pottery fragments found around the site.
What is a Harris diagram?
A Harris Matrix is a tool that archaeologists use to keep track of stratigraphy and stratigraphic units. By using the laws of stratigraphy, archaeologists create these logic diagrams to record the top-down sequence of stratigraphic deposits and help make sense of the information they contain.
What do you call a piece of broken pottery?
A shard is simply a broken piece of metal, glass, stone, or pottery with sharp edges.
Why is it called a Harris Matrix?
It is called a Harris or sometimes a Harris-Winchester matrix because it was invented by the archaeologist Edward Harris, who at the time was working on excavations in Winchester, Hampshire.
How do you make a Harris Matrix?
2:588:45Harris Matrix Tutorial - YouTubeYouTube
Is kintsugi wabi sabi?
The Japanese practice that perhaps most exemplifies the spirit of wabi-sabi is kintsugi. Kintsugi is the art of golden joinery, in which broken objects – usually ceramics – are mended with gold-dusted lacquer. Kintsugis exact origins are unknown, but some historians date it as far back as the late 15th century.
What is it called when you fix something with gold?
Kintsugi (金継ぎ, golden joinery), also known as kintsukuroi (金繕い, golden repair), is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum, a method similar to the maki-e technique.