Description
Book SynopsisAncient clay cooking pots in the southern Levant are unappealing, rough pots that are not easily connected to meals known from ancient writings or iconographic representations. To narrow the gap between excavated sherds and ancient meals, the approach adopted in this study starts by learning how food traditionally was processed, preserved, cooked, stored, and transported in clay containers. This research is based on the cookware and culinary practices in traditional societies in Cyprus and the Levant, where people still make pots by hand.Clay pots were not only to cook or hold foods. Their absorbent and permeable walls stored memories of food residue. Clay jars were automatic yogurt makers and fermentation vats for wine and beer, while jugs were the traditional water coolers and purifiers. Dairy foods, grains, and water lasted longer and/or tasted better when stored or prepared in clay pots. Biblical texts provide numerous terms for cookware without details of how they looked, how they were used, or why there are so many different words.Recent studies of potters for over a century in the southern Levant provide a wealth of names whose diversity helps to delineate the various categories of ancient cookware and names in the text. Ancient Cookware from the Levant begins with a description of five data sources: excavations, ancient and medieval texts, 20th century government reports, early accounts of potters, and ethnoarchaeological studies. The final section focuses on the shape, style, and manufacture of cookware for the past 12,000 years. For archaeologists, changes in cooking pot morphology offer important chronological information for dating entire assemblages, from Neolithic to recent times. The survey of pot shapes in Israel, Palestine, and Jordan presents how different shapes were made and used.
Table of ContentsPreface Introduction Part I: Traditional Ceramics in the Levant and Cyprus1.The Levantine Corridor and Cyprus - Geographical Parameters2. Ancient Data Sources: Excavations and Ancient Texts3. Modern Data Sources: Government Reports, Early Visitors, and Ethnoarchaeology4. Ceramic Ethnoarchaeology5. Clay Deposits, Traditional Mining, and Clay Preparation in Cyprus6. Manufacturing Technique for Cypriot Red Clays 7. Traditional Firing Techniques for Ceramics 8. How to Treat Clay Pots Prior to Use with Food9. Making Breads, Roasting Grains, and Cooking Other Food 10. Foods Processed, Preserved, Distilled, or Transported in Ceramics 11. How to Clean Clay Pots Part II: Ancient Manufacturing Techniques for Cookware12. Ancient Clay Containers to Process, Cook, and Preserve Food 13. Ancient Manufacturing Techniques and Clay Bodes Part III: Cookware through the Ages14. Neolithic and Chalcolithic Cookware 15. Early Bronze Age Cookware 16. Middle and Late Bronze Age Cookware 17. Iron Age and Persian Era Cookware 18. Classical Era Cookware 19. Medieval Era Cookware 20. Late Ottoman/Mandate and Recent Wheel-thrown Ceramics 21. Late Ottoman/Mandate and Recent Handmade Ceramics 22. Implications of Ethnoarchaeological Studies for Ancient Cookware Glossary
