EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES ON ERTEBØLLE POTTERY: FOOD PREPARATION AND RADIOCARBON DATING


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Abstract

This article summarizes my experimental and archaeological research about the earliest pottery in Northern Germany and Denmark, belonging to the Ertebølle culture, a Late Mesolithic hunter-gatherer-fisher culture. I will present firing and cooking experiments with copies of Ertebølle pottery and how a reference collection of experimental food crusts can be used to understand issues of radiocarbon reservoir effects and stable isotope measurements in food crusts. It will be shown that cooking food resources with a reservoir age, such as marine or freshwater fish, leads to the same reservoir age in the pottery. The results from the experiments will be compared to the archaeological record. I will discuss the implications of the experimental studies for radiocarbon dating of archaeological pottery, and for studies of style and function of ceramics.

About the authors

Bente Philippsen

Aarhus AMS Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy

Author for correspondence.
Email: bphilipp@phys.au.dk

Ph.D.

Aarhus AMS Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University. Ny Munkegade 120, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.

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