Élément de puzzle ou de cadavre exquis ?

• Main Author: Aline Visseyrias
• Format: Article
• Language: fra
• Published: Editions de la Maison des Sciences de l'Homme 2010-03-01
• Series: Les Nouvelles de l’Archéologie
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/nda/969

Ceramic is a cultural recording: forms and decorations inform us about stylistics and functional choices, the processes of shaping bring to light the technical ones. We were interested in a stage of the chaîne opératoire, the shaping of the potteries when the potter's wheel was not yet known. Our observations relate to ceramics of the Later Bronze age (1400-750 cal BC) between the Rhine and the Rhone and to ceramics from the necropolis of Sanga (Katanga, DRC). To detect the marks of shaping on these archaeological containers, we worked out an experimental frame of reference of the ceramic techniques. The aim of our research project was to determinate the levels of know-how, seize the technical choices and their variations. Our aim was to test the method we worked out on archaeological and ethnological ceramics, and to confront it with the results of other analyses within a team. The goal of this study was to establish a mode of controlled diagnosis for the recognition of tne ceramics shaping techniques and to explore the field of social interactions provided, from the household level to peopling space : who produces, how, why and for whom.