Household Ceramic Economies: Production and consumption of household ceramics among the Maros villagers of Bronze Age Hungary

Description

This work examines the interrelationship between technology and society, using as its cultural-historical focus the Early and Middle Bronze Age periods among the Maros group villages of south-eastern Hungary. To claim that technology is social is not new, but to document how it is social has been difficult and this research aims to provide such documentation, using a ceramic archaeological example. As a result, the author's emphasis is on technological activities and the human actors that performed them. Practice theory, with its focus on conscious social actors, provides the major theoretical direction. Methodologically, to examine a wide range of ceramic technological activities, the author embraces the concept of the 'operational sequence', following ceramics from the procurement and preparation of raw materials, through their forming, finishing and firing, to their use. Through the potter's eye, the author tries to understand the choices made at each step of the production sequence and consider the ways in which they could have organized their labour. To obtain such diverse information, diverse sets of methods, borrowed from archaeology, geology and materials science are employed. Front Cover Title Page Copyright Dedication PROLOGUE ACKNOWLEDGMENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES LIST OF FIGURES LIST OF APPENDICES CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION CHAPTER 2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND CHAPTER 3 EXAMINING CERAMIC PRODUCTION AND USE IN THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL RECORD CHAPTER 4 BACKGROUND TO THE MAROS CHAPTER 5 METHODOLOGY CHAPTER 6 THE MAROS HOUSEHOLD CERAMICS: A FUNCTIONAL CLASSIFICATION CHAPTER 7 THE OPERATIONAL SEQUENCE OF THE MAROS CERAMIC PRODUCTION CHAPTER 8 THE MAROS CERAMIC ECONOMIES: A SYNTHESIS CHAPTER 9 CONCLUSIONS APPENDICES BIBLIOGRAPHY