TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY: WHEEL-THROWING AT

MIDDLE MINOAN KNOSSOSI

(PLATES 16-23)

INTRODUCTION

THE appearance of wheel-throwing technology is generally accorded significance in archaeological explanations concerning the emergence of social complexity. It is regarded as a sure sign of full-time craft specialists, owing to the capital investment and skill it requires. It implies a well-developed occupational differentiation within society, itself one of the main features of complexity.

More often than not, the phenomenon is regarded as being economic in nature. So if asked 'what impels the process to take place', the reply might be: 'the existing production system sought to increase efficiency owing to the pressures placed upon it by increased consumer demand'. In many different contexts a range of economic factors have been evoked to account for the evolution of craft specialization, such as population growth, economic differentiation, agricultural intensification, unequal access to economic resources, maximization of profits, and control of production by an 6lite.2 Only this last is a more than purely economic explanation, incorporating as it does a political component. In this article a hypothesis is presented that seeks to incorporate economic, political and cultural considerations in explaining the appearance of wheel-throwing technology in Minoan Crete.

THE MINOAN PICTURE

In the context of Minoan Crete, the common assumptions about the potter's wheel are certainly prevalent. Most archaeologists seem to consider the wheel technique as a failsafe indicator of full-time craft specialization. Moreover, it is considered to be a development driven by economic factors.3 But what is particularly striking, and what lends the phenomenon greater significance, is that it coincides in time with a whole series of other innovations. These innovations are in a number of domains, for example: monumental architecture, use of administrative documents, long-distance exchange, ritual practice, centralized storage, and regional political organization. One implication is that there are not only craft specialists but specialists in a number of fields (architects, bureaucrats, priests, traders). Changes in all of these areas accelerate in the First Palace Period, around 1950 BC, signalling a major horizon of

I II am extremely grateful to the Managing Committee of the British School at Athens for permission to illustrate unpublished pottery, to Mr Sinclair Hood and Dr Colin Macdonald for allowing access to material, and to Professor Sander van der Leeuw for invaluable assistance and advice. My warmest thanks go also to Dr Todd Whitelaw, not only for reading earlier versions of this paper, but also for his constant encouragement and support.

2 V. Roux and D. Corbetta, The Potter's Wheel: Craft Specialisation and Technical Competence (Delhi, 1990o).

3 e.g. A. C. Renfrew, The Emergence of Civilization: The Cyclades and the Aegean in the 3rd Millennium Bc (London, 1972); L. V Watrous, 'The role of the Near East in the rise of the Cretan palaces', in R. Higg and N. Marinatos (eds), The Function of the Minoan Palaces (Stockholm, 1987), 65 70.

102 CARL KNAPPETT

social change. It is therefore of great interest to consider in what way the wheel-throwing innovation fits into, or is representative of, these wider patterns.

FEWER ASSUMPTIONS

The assumption that the wheel technique is an important economic innovation needs to be questioned. Given that in Minoan Crete the innovation develops in a context of major political developments, during which we observe the emergence of early states around palatial centres, we should perhaps be open to the possibility that political factors have a role to play. Aegean archaeologists are not accustomed to the notion that politics may impinge upon the process of technological change. Technology is often equated to the 'technical', the mechanical process of action upon matter, whilst its irreducible social component is usually ignored.4 However, a spate of recent ethnoarchaeological and anthropological studies demonstrate the role of not only political but also symbolic factors in technological processes.5

MORE DETAIL

It is fair to say that most Minoan archaeologists believe there to have been a simple switch in MM I B from hand-building techniques to wheel-throwing. There are only rare exceptions to the prevailing assumption that there was, across the island, a sudden and inevitable substitution of wheel-made vessels for handmade ones. For example, MacGillivray6 acknowledges that a range of intermediate possibilities exist between handmade and wheel-thrown, a range to which he assigns the single label 'proto-wheel-made', deliberately ambiguous 'pending future analyses focussing on formation techniques'.7 Betancourt indicates that MM I B pottery at Kommos is in fact only rarely wheel-thrown, with 90 per cent of all cups in the period actually being handmade conical cups.8 He implies that much the same is true of Phaistos. By MM II A however, the emphasis in the manufacture of small vessels (Betancourt makes little mention of larger types) has been transferred dramatically to wheel-throwing; this serves to demonstrate the more complex nature of the innovation process, which was more nuanced than just a wholesale switch in MM I B itself. However, we do need much more detailed analysis of how the innovation progresses, both before and after the MM I B period.

BEFORE AND DURING MM I B

Let us examine first the processes leading up to what is widely considered the major period of innovation in MM I B. There is some debate as to what actually did happen prior to MM I B in terms of forming techniques. Was there a slow and continuous local evolution of technique

4 B. Pfaffenberger, 'Social anthropology of technology', Annual Review of Anthropology, 21 (1992), 491-516.

5 D. A. Papousek, 'Technological change as social

rebellion,' in S. E. van der Leeuw and R. E. Torrence (eds), What's New? A Closer Look at the Process of Innovation (London,

I989) 140-66; EP. Lemonnier, Elements for an Anthropology of Technology (Ann Arbor, 1992); M-C. Mahias, 'Pottery techniques in India: technical variants and social choice', in P. Lemonnier (ed.), Technological Choices: Transformations in Material Culture since the Neolithic (London, 1993).

J J. A. MacGillivray, Knossos: Pottery Groups of the Old Palace

Period (BSA Studies, 5; London, I998). 7 In this way he repeats the comments of G. M. Foster,

'The Coyotepec Molde and some associated problems of the

potter's wheel', Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 15 (i959), 53-63 (= 1959a); id., 'The potter's wheel: an analysis of idea and artifact in invention', ibid, 99-119 (= i959b).

8 P. P. Betancourt, 'The Middle Minoan pottery of Southern Crete and the question of a Middle Minoan Thalassocracy', in R. Hagg and N. Marinatos (eds), The Minoan Thalassocracy: Myth and Reality (Stockholm, 1984), 89-92; id., Kommos, ii. The Final Neolithic Through Middle Minoan III Pottery (Princeton, I990).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY io3

Troy

aTiry

AEGEAN SEA

Triandk Knossos

Tarsus

Ras Shamra

LIBYAN SEA Byblos

0 500 km

Abydos

The Eastern Mediterranean (showing sites mentioned in the text).

104 CARL KNAPPETT

stretching back to EM II, or was there a rather sudden introduction from outside Crete (e.g. the Near East, Anatolia or the Greek mainland)?

1. NEAR EASTERN IMPORT?

It had usually been argued that the wheel was an innovation introduced from the Near East, ex oriente lux. In this hypothesis the more advanced features of the Near East were adopted by societies on their periphery only once they were sufficiently developed to make use of them.9 One can see the attraction of this diffusion hypothesis, with the technique seemingly spreading gradually west. After an initial appearance in Mesopotamia in the late fourth millennium BC, thereafter wheel-made pottery is seen at Tarsus'o in Cilicia (south central Anatolia), during the third millennium BC, and still further west in Troy," during phase IIb (c. 2500 BC). In Egypt it would appear to come in during the 6th Dynasty, c. 2400-2300oo BC.'2 It also makes an early appearance during the latter part of the third millennium on the Greek mainland at sites such as Lefkandi, Lerna and Tiryns, where it is thought to derive from Anatolia.'s3 Although wheel technology is more often argued to come to Crete from Egypt, it has been suggested that use of the fast wheel was disseminated from the Argolid to Kythera and then to Crete.'4 There are, however, some problems with this idea, namely that the earliest wheel-made forms on Crete are quite unlike those on the mainland, and that the wheel does not really continue into the Middle Helladic period at all clearly. This is not to mention the limited evidence for mainland contacts in EM III-MM I A and MM I B-II.

2. LOCAL DEVELOPMENT?

An alternative hypothesis is that wheel technology developed slowly on Crete through a process of evolution, with a gradual increase in the degree of rotational assistance employed in manufacture. This idea found support with the discovery at the Early Minoan II site of Fournou Korifi of a number of clay discs probably used as turntables.'s If pottery was already being made on turntables in EM II, some 500 years before the first full use of wheel-throwing in MM I B, then an internal process of evolution is not out of the question.'6 Moreover, it has also been asserted that the wheel was already in use at Knossos as early as EM III,'I well before what is assumed to be the first wheel-use in MM I B. The evidence for this comes in the form of a handful of footed

goblets, mostly from MM I A contexts but one or two from EM III contexts (such as the Upper East Well), which show wheel rilling at the interior body. If the wheel was already in use in EM III and MM I A, it seems that it was only used in a very limited way to make this one form.

9 J. D. S. Pendlebury, The Archaeology of Crete: An Introduction

(London, r939); V G. Childe, 'Rotary motion', in C. Singer, E. J. Holmyard, and A. R. Hall (eds), History of Technology, i (London, '954), 187; R. Higgins, Minoan and Mycenaean Art

(London, I967); A. D. Lacy, Greek Pottery in the Bronze Age (London, 1967).

so H. Goldman, Excavations at Gdzlii Kule, Tarsus, ii

(Princeton, 1956), I3'. 11 C. Blegen, Troy, i (1950), 205. 12 D. Arnold and J. Bourriau (eds), An Introduction to Ancient

Egyptian Pottery (Mainz, 1993). 13 J. B. Rutter, 'Fine gray-burnished pottery of the Early

Helladic III period: the ancestry of Gray Minyan', Hesp. 52 (1983), 327-55; O. T. P K. Dickinson, The Aegean Bronze Age (Cambridge, 1994).

'4 J. B. Rutter and C. Zerner, 'Early Hellado-Minoan

contacts', in Hagg and Marinatos (n. 8), 75-83. 'i5 P M. Warren, 'An Early Bronze Age potter's workshop

in Crete', Antiquity, 43 (1969), 224-7. '6 Recent work in the Near East suggests that the adoption

there of wheel-throwing involved a very gradual evolution of concept, developed first through a stage of wheel-shaping, cf. V. Roux and M.-A. Courty, 'Identification of wheel throwing on the basis of ceramic surface features and microfabrics', Journal ofArchaeological Science, 22 (1995), I7-50.

'7 P. M. Day, D. E. Wilson, and E. Kiriatzi, 'Reassessing specialisation in Prepalatial Cretan ceramic production', in P. Betancourt and R. Laffineur (eds), TEXNH: Craftsmen, Craftswomen, and Craftsmanship in the Aegean Bronze Age, (Aegaeum, 16; Lihge, 1997), 275-90.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY Io5

3 OR BOTH?

Of course a compromise hypothesis may also be entertained--that there was both a gradual evolution of concept on Crete dating back to the Early Minoan period, and a degree of contact with the Near East which provided added impetus and perhaps acted as a catalyst. Even if the wheel was already known to certain Minoan potters in the late Prepalatial period, the technique may not have taken off until the Protopalatial period because of wider regional developments, whether economic, political, or cultural in nature.

DURING AND AFTER MM I B: NEW APPROACH, NEW EVIDENCE

The principal focus here, however, is on what happened during and after MM I B. The wheel- throwing technique continued to develop along interesting lines for some considerable time after MM I B, and these patterns of change can help us to understand more fully the dynamics of this technological innovation. But what evidence is there available that allows us to track this process?

WHEEL DEVICES

One obvious starting point would be to study changes in the actual wheel device used from period to period, but the evidence is not of sufficient resolution. It is clear that from Prepalatial contexts we only have turntables (or 'mats'), and that wheel devices capable of generating sufficient rotative kinetic energy for throwing only appear in the Protopalatial Period.'" The wheels that have been found are not from well-dated contexts at the exact time of the transition, i.e. MM I A, MM I B, and MM II A. All five Protopalatial examples come from Mallia, where it is not possible to assign relative dates as precisely as at Knossos: one can talk of MM I or MM II, but not MM I B, MM II A, and MM II B. All in all we can really only distinguish between Prepalatial turntables/mats on the one hand, and Protopalatial wheels (Evely's type 3C) on the other. Lastly, it is impossible with the current evidence to trace an evolution in the device through the course of the Protopalatial period.

THE POTTERY

In the absence, therefore, of suitable evidence on the wheel devices themselves, it is imperative that we turn our attention to the finished products, and examine the traces of manufacture preserved upon them. We must also look in detail at the characteristics of the first wheel-made vessels.

However, this is hampered by the real lack of stratified deposits in a relative sequence dating to the key periods involved. One site that does have such material is Kommos, and it has permitted Betancourt to make some pertinent observations. When we turn to East Crete, there are certainly MM I deposits, but it is rarely possible to define them as clearly MM I A or MM I B.'9 At Malia, for example, only very recently has a distinct MM I B stratum with

18 D. Evely, 'The potters' wheel in Minoan Crete', BSA 83 (1988), 83- 126.

19 S. Andreou, Pottery Groups of the Old Palace Period in Crete (PhD dissertation, Cincinnati, I978).

Io6 CARL KNAPPETT

ceramic material been uncovered, following a series of soundings conducted by Poursat beneath floor levels in Quartier Mu.20 The MM I B date assigned to House Theta by van Effenterre" can be discounted (as being in fact MM II), and the material from 'Les Maisons Suds' is MM I A-B." Myrtos Pyrgos Period II c-d can also be given a date of MM I A-B, and elsewhere in East Crete the prospects of separating a distinct MM I B phase stratigraphically and stylistically are, for the moment, not much greater.

One way of overcoming these shortcomings is to turn to a site with material from secure contexts dated to the periods leading up to MM II B. The remarkably good sequence of deposits at Knossos, allows us to examine the development of the innovation, and the sorts of vessels involved, from just before, during and for some time after the first wheel-thrown pottery occurs. Another possibility would be Phaistos.23

THE KNOSSIAN SEQUENCE

In selecting Knossian material to study on the basis of its superior chronological resolution, we have to be reasonably confident that the various deposits to be examined do indeed follow one another in a relative sequence. A brief review of some of the past and present literature on the topic reveals that this has never been an altogether straightforward exercise. Ever since some of the very earliest contributions of Evans24 and MacKenzie,25 opinion has wavered as to whether various Old Palace period deposits should be assigned to MM I B or MM II A. Very recently, however, some degree of consensus has been reached amongst Minoan scholars at Knossos concerning the status of these periods and those that precede and follow them. This is largely due to a collaborative effort that has allowed for key deposits of each Early Minoan and Middle Minoan phase to be placed in a relative sequence upon which all (or nearly all) agree."6 In addition, the fortunes of archaeological recovery have played their part, with important deposits of MM I B and MM II A date having been excavated in I992 and 1993.27 Finally, the publication of MacGillivray's meticulous thesis on Old Palace Period pottery groups from Sir Arthur Evans' excavations now provides an invaluable wealth of information and insight. These encouraging signs notwithstanding, it would be foolish to believe that the relative sequence as it currently stands at Knossos is for ever firmly established and writ in stone; further discoveries may introduce new doubts and fresh expectations. A brief overview of the past century of research focussing on these matters, i.e. the status of MM I B and MM II A in relation to one another, should serve to demonstrate the nature of this process. MM I B and MM II A are of key importance as it is

during these periods that we can examine some of the earliest stages in the long process of innovation.

2o J.-C. Poursat, 'Le debut de l'6poque protopalatiale a

Malia', in EL2ao0vrl, Mlanges N Platon (Athens, 1987), 46I-6. 21 H. and M. van Effenterre, 'Maisons IV: Le Quartier

Theta (1959-60)', Etudes cretoises (Paris, 1976). 22 cf. Andreou (n. 19).

23 At Knossos itself there are very few closed deposits of MM IIB date.

24 A. J. Evans, 'The palace at Knossos. Provisional report of the excavations', BSA io (1903-4), 1-62.

25 D. E. MacKenzie, 'The Middle Minoan pottery of Knossos',JHS 26 (1906), 243-67.

26 G. Cadogan, P. M. Day, C. F. Macdonald, S. A. MacGillivray, N. Momigliano, T. M. Whitelaw, and D. E. Wilson, 'Early Minoan and Middle Minoan pottery groups at Knossos', BSA 88 (1993), 21-8.

27 C. E Macdonald, E. Hatzaki, and C. Knappett, 'Middle Minoan pottery from south of the South-West House, Knossos', BSA Studies (forthcoming).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 107

SPECIAL FOCUS ON MM I B AND MM II A CHRONOLOGY

The first published word on Middle Minoan pottery at Knossos did not go to Evans, but to Hogarth and Welch, who described the pottery they encountered in their 1900oo excavations of Houses to the south and west of the palace as being 'primitive', 'pre-Mycenaean' and, 'Kamares'.28 This last ascription was due to their knowledge of the work ofJ. L. Myres, who, in 1895, had seen and drawn the pottery from the Kamares cave, located in the mountains to the north of Phaistos in the Mesara.29 Apart from MacKenzie's 1903 contribution,30 the next that concerns us is that of Evans in i903-4,3' by which time he had already excavated a great deal of the palace. A key deposit for him was the Early Chamber Beneath the West Court, which he attributes at this time to MM II. He links various other deposits to this one,32 saying they were all probably submerged in a general destruction that struck the site in this epoch. MacKenzie reiterates this point in his I9o6 article, and lists the deposits he considers to be part of the same event (in the North-East Kamares Area, the South-East Kamares Area, the East Central Area, and the North-West Kamares Area).

However, by the time of the publication of the first volume of The Palace of Minos, Evans had revised his opinion.33 The Early Chamber Beneath the West Court is reassigned to MM I B, the phase marking the beginning of the Early Palace; Evans states that before this deposit was placed in this phase, there was a major lacuna in the sequence. The Royal Pottery Stores remain as MM II A, which effectively means that the single destruction horizon described in

I904 and 1906 has now been separated into two distinct episodes. Whilst in vol. i (1921) Evans is unable to put forward any other deposit representative of MM I B, by vol. iv (1936) he has realized that much of the material excavated by Hogarth and Welch can also be assigned to MM I B. In addition, he changes the date ascribed to a carinated bowl from the Early Town Drain: in vol. i it is MM I A, but by vol. iv it has become MM I B. A similar transformation is also seen for a tumbler and a carinated cup from East Crete. The reason why Evans reviews his ideas concerning MM I B in the period between 1904 and 1921,34 and the role MacKenzie played in this process, is unclear. Momigliano35 notes that MacKenzie worked alongside Evans in the latter's house in Youlbury during the First World War, and it may have been in this period that the revisions were made.

Evans' chronology was challenged by Hazzidakis, who saw in his material excavated from Gournes and Tylissos grounds for amalgamating the Early and Middle Minoan periods.36 Doubt was also cast upon the sequence of Evans by Aberg,37 but he in turn was swiftly contradicted by Pendlebury, who follows much the same line as Evans in respect of MM I B/II A. He even shows a similar scant regard for Hogarth and Welch, illustrating some of their material as being characteristic of MM I B,38 without even mentioning them as the excavators.

28 D. G. Hogarth and E B. Welch, 'Primitive painted pottery in Crete', JHS 21 (1901), 78-98.

20 J. L. Myres, 'Prehistoric polychrome pottery from Kamarais in Crete', Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, 15 (1895), 351-6.

30 D. E. MacKenzie, 'The pottery of Knossos', JHS 23 (1903), 157 205.

3' Evans (n. 24). 32 Levels beneath the Olive Press Room, the Kamares

Magazines in the SE Palace Quarter, and the NW Pit. 33 A.J. Evans, The Palace of Minos at Knossos, i (London, 192I).

34 MacGillivray (n. 6) is also uncertain as to why Evans alters his opinion, but supposes that it was on stylistic grounds.

03 N. Momigliano, 'Duncan MacKenzie: a cautious canny Highlander', in C. Morris (ed.), Klados: Essays in Honour of J. J. Coldstream, (BICS supp. 63; London, 1995), 163-70.

36J. Hazzidakis, Les villas minoennes de Tylissos (Paris, 1934). For subsequent criticism cf. A. Zois, ealo'taKci (Athens, 1969).

37 N. Aberg, Bronzezeitliche und fiiheisenzeitliche Chronologie, iv Griechenland (Stockholm, 1933).

38 Pendlebury (n. 9), pls xvi-xvii.

Io8 CARL KNAPPETT

It is only in the I950s that we see attention devoted anew to these periods, with Levi's uncovering of previously untouched areas of the Old Palace at Phaistos, and at Knossos with Hood's 1957-61 excavations along the south side of the Royal Road, and to the south of the palace. The Royal Road South excavations provided a crucial sequence, missing from within the palace proper, of MM II A stratified over MM I B, late MM I A, and MM I A. Here again we witness an oscillation in the dates attributed to certain deposits. In the 1959-6o Archaeological Reports, Hood describes the above sequence with the dates shown. Yet, in 196239 the upper deposit is called MM II B, stratified over MM I B. But by 1966 Hood has returned to his original assignation and the upper deposit is once again considered to be MM II A.40 Activity resumed again in 1973 when Hood put in soundings in Early Magazines A and C, and unearthed a deposit he dated to MM I B.4' It is worth noting that these deposits are awaiting publication, thereby complicating any current attempts at defining the different Middle Minoan periods.

Indeed such are the problems with Middle Minoan on Crete that the only major palatial site to have had its ceramics extensively and systematically published is Phaistos.42 Publication has not stemmed the flow of debate since the 196os concerning both Levi's stratigraphic sequence and the relative chronology, although it is now increasingly accepted that much of Phase Ib is actually contemporaneous with Phase II, i.e. both being MM II B. There remains only a small percentage of what was originally called Phase Ib that is still considered to be antecedent, and this is now called Phase Ib iniziale.43 Even accepting these ambiguities one might think that the publication of this material would be of great use in clarifying the problems of chronological definition at Knossos. Although of course there are some strong general similarities, they are not so striking as to be of any great use in separating MM I B from MM II A at Knossos. For example, both sites do of course have conical cups, Vapheio cups, hemispherical cups, bridge-spouted jars, spouted jars, pithoi, etc.-yet the conical cups are really quite different,44 and the Phaistos amphorae show stronger ties with the Mallia- Lasithi region than with Knossos. Phaistos and Knossos are the two main producers of Kamares fine tablewares, but here we are faced with two major problems in using one site's sequence to understand the others. Firstly, Kamares Ware is so infinitely inventive and varied that it is difficult to find two identical examples. Secondly, there is the very strong possibility that Kamares pottery found at Knossos was imported from Phaistos workshops, and vice versa. Fabric analyses seem to show that certain specific similarities between the two sites are a matter of ceramic imports rather than stylistic parallels.45

In his 1978 thesis Andreou46 did not deal specifically with Knossian Protopalatial pottery. However, by examining the deposits that one might argue for being MM I A, notably the Kouloures Houses, the Vat Room, and the Monolithic Pillar Basement, as well as mentioning Hood's Royal Road South (RRS) material, he did at least hint that, were he to follow the periods through, he would side with Evans (and presumably Hood at this stage) in having a

39 M. S. F Hood, 'Stratigraphic excavations at Knossos',

Kprplridi Xpovicdc, 15/16 (1961-2), 92-7. 4o Id., 'The Early and Middle Minoan periods at Knossos',

BICS 13 (1966), II0-II.

4' Id., AR 1973-4. 42 D. Levi, Festos e la civilta minoica, I (Incunabula Graeca,

60; Rome, 1976); D. Levi and F. Carinci, Festos e la civilta minoica, II, (Incunabula Graeca, 77; Rome, 1988).

43 cf. Levi and Carinci (n. 42). 44 For Phaistos types, cf. E. Fiandra, 'Skutelia MM a

Festos', in Cretological, (1973), 84-91. 45 P M. Day and D. E. Wilson, 'Consuming power:

Kamares Ware in Protopalatial Knossos', Antiquity, 72 (1998), 350-8.

46 Andreou (n. 19).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY IO9

distinct MM I B represented by Hood's material and Evans' Early Chamber Beneath the West Court.

At about the same time Walberg presented her study of Kamares pottery employing a Furumarkian methodology.47 The reservations one may harbour over the appropriateness of her methods, as expressed by Levi and Carinci,48 are not as important here as her chronological system in which MM I A is called 'Pre-Kamares', MM I B-II A is 'Early Kamares', MM II B- III A is 'Classical Kamares', and MM III B is 'Post-Kamares'. The grouping together of MM I B and MM II A represents an unnecessary backward step. Furthermore, her discussion of certain stratigraphic contexts is flawed. For example, she claims that the Early Chamber Beneath the West Court, the example from Evans's excavations of a closed MM I B deposit, is a mixed context with material from Early Kamares to Post-Kamares. Moreover, she groups together the Royal Pottery Stores, for Evans the classic MM II A deposit, and the Loomweight Basement, Evans's type deposit for MM II B, as being both Classical Kamares (MM II B-III A). By the time of her 1983 publication,49 Walberg has shifted her categories: Early Kamares is still MM I B-II A, but Classical Kamares has become MM II A-II B-III A.

In the meantime important contributions dealing specifically with Early and Middle Minoan chronology, relative and absolute, were made by both Warren and Cadogan.s5 Together they serve to reinforce the sequence put forward by Hood in 1966, much in line with Evans's final word. Cadogan states that the post-war excavations of Hood at Knossos, and by Fiandra at Phaistos, permit the retention of Evans's phases MM I B, II A, and II B. This line of argument finds further strong support in the volume on Aegean Bronze Age chronology by Warren and Hankey.5'

The next contribution to the problems of Old Palace chronology at Knossos came from MacGillivray;52 in his thesis there is no place for MM I B (or MM II B for that matter), and a whole series of deposits are grouped together into MM II A (whilst acknowledging that there may be MM I B outside the palace, for example in the Royal Road deposits). The Royal Pottery Stores, the Early Chamber Beneath the West Court, parts of the North-West Kamares Area (but not the North-West Pit, said to be mixed), and parts of the East Central Enclave (e.g. Early Floor Beneath the Room of the Olive Press) are all placed together in a destruction horizon at the end of MM II A. In 1990 MacGillivray argues further: 'The Old Palace did not contain any MM I B pottery and thus probably did not exist in MM I B ...'53 Evans also notes early on that in the palace 'floor deposits representing pottery of this later MM I class have not to come to light there'.54 However, Evans himself was aware of the continuous occupation of the palace and the subsequent possibility that certain levels simply might not survive; hence he does not argue, as MacGillivray in fact does, that no pots means no palace. Nonetheless, the late MM I lacuna did puzzle Evans in 1904 (and MacKenzie 1906), and MacGillivray's argumentss55 find extraordinary parallels with this early stance of Evans. Of course, by the time

47 G. Walberg, Kamares: A Study of the Character of Palatial Middle Minoan Pottery (Uppsala, 1976).

48 Levi and Carinci (n. 42). 49 G. Walberg, Provincial Middle Minoan Pottery (Mainz, 1983). 50 P. M. Warren, 'Problems of chronology in Crete and the

Aegean in the 3rd and early 2nd millennia BC', AJA 84 (1980), 487-99; G. Cadogan, 'Early Minoan and Middle Minoan chronology', AJA 87 (1983), 507-I8.

5' P M. Warren and V. Hankey, Aegean Bronze Age Chronology (Bristol, 1989).

52 J. A. MacGillivray, Pottery Groups of the Old Palace Period at Knossos (Ph.D. thesis, University of Edinburgh, 1986).

53 Id., 'The foundation of the Old Palaces in Crete', Cretological, 6, AI (1990), 429-34.

54 Evans (n. 33), 186. 55 MacGillivray (ns. 52, 53).

IIo CARL KNAPPETT

The Palace of Minos was published, Evans had revised his opinions (see above), and we have also observed above how Hood's post-war excavations support rather well Evans's chronology as expressed in The Palace of Minos. What is most fascinating is that MacGillivray experiences a similar conversion so that he too, like Evans, begins to see both MM I B and MM II A in the palace where before he saw only MM II. In a I994 articles6 he states that the MM I B material from the Early West Magazines A and C, and the Royal Road South Middle Basements, allows for the identification of MM I B material from the East Wing of the Palace (i.e. from Evans's excavations), even if now mixed with material dating to MM II A. The presence of such material suggests that both East and West Wings of the Palace were constructed and fully functioning in MM I B.57

Despite MacGillivray's flexibility, an indispensable quality in Minoan ceramic studies, his earlier work had already caused some confusion. The continuation in 1987 of Hood's 1973 soundings in the Early West Magazines revealed yet more material; however in the 1987-8 Archaeological Reports it was assigned to MM II A, rather than to MM I B as originally put forward. Another victim is the 1989 thesis of Momigliano,58 in which she vigorously asserts, using many of MacGillivray's criteria, that much of the material from the Vat Room, Monolithic Pillar Basement, and Early Magazines I and II is MM II A in date (against the MM I A date assigned by Andreou 1978). She too finds no place for MM I B in her discussions although, like MacGillivray, it would appear that she has more recently revised her chronological attributions.59

It would be misleading to say that confusion reigned; Warren and Hankey appear unperturbed,60 seemingly not making use of or having had access to MacGillivray's thesis. Nonetheless one might say that the status quo was only fully restored in 1992 with the excavation by Macdonald of a MM II A deposit to the south-west of the palace, and with a pottery seminar held at Knossos during which some consensus was reached as to how deposits were to be situated in a relative sequence.6' It was perhaps through participation in this seminar that MacGillivray, and indeed Momigliano, came to revise their positions on the Knossian chronology

The position reached in the seminar was further reinforced by the excavation in 1993 of two extraordinary MM II A deposits'62 in an area to the west of the South-West House (and indeed further west than the I992 excavation). In combination with the Early West Magazines MM I B material, and Hood's Royal Road South MM I A to II A material, we can now note some of the key ceramic features of MM I B and II A. MM II B is still somewhat problematic in that in the palace it frequently seems to be mixed with MM III A material,63 for example in the Kouloures and the South East Kamares Area.64 Only Trial KV, in Knossos village,65 and some of the Mavro

Spelio tombs,66 are referred to by Cadogan et al. as being clearly representative of MM II B.

56 Id., 'The early history of the Palace at Knossos (MM I-II)', in D. Evely et al. (eds), A Labyrinth of History: Papers in

Honour of Sinclair Hood, (Oxford, i994), 45-55. 57 Contra Pendlebury (n. 9), and MacGillivray (n. 53). 58 N. Momigliano, 'MM I A pottery from Evans'

excavations at Knossos: a reassessment', BSA 86 (199I), 150-271.

59 For example, N. Momigliano and D. E. Wilson, 'Knossos 1993: excavations outside the south front of the Palace', BSA 90 (1996), 1-57. They identify a fill of pottery beneath the Early Paving of the south front of the palace at Knossos as belonging to MM I B, as defined in Cadogan et

al. (n. 26).

60 Warren and Hankey (n. 51). "' Cadogan et al. (n. 26). '62 cf. Macdonald, Hatzaki, and Knappett (n. 27). 63 The Loomweight Basement as described by Sir Arthur

Evans (n. 33) appears to have had MM III A stratified over

deposits of MM II B (cf. also MacGillivray, n. 6), but the material from these two strata in the Stratigraphical Museum seems to have become mixed.

64 Cf. MacGillivray (n. 56). 65 M. R. Popham, 'Trial KV (1969), a Middle Minoan

building at Knossos,' BSA 69 (1974), 181-94. 66 E.J. Forsdyke, 'The Mlavro Spelio cemetery at Knossos',

BSA 28 (1927), 243-96.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY III

SOME CERAMIC FEATURES OF MM I B AND MM II A

The pottery most often cited as being characteristic of the Knossian Old Palace period is Kamares Ware, a fine ware often in elaborate shapes with complex polychrome decoration on a dark lustrous ground. It has attracted enduring attention thanks to its aesthetic qualities which make it a ready subject for the art historical approach pursued in many Minoan ceramic studies. Unfortunately the admiration for the 'fine Kamares Ware artists' is accompanied by a disdain for the products of the 'workaday craftsmen'"6 who, unlike their talented Kamares cousins, were unable to rid themselves of 'the need to devote themselves to dull mass-production'.68

This category of pottery was also significant early on when it was revealed that Petrie had uncovered Kamares vessels in Egyptian Dynastic contexts, thereby enabling Minoan scholars to relate their ceramic sequences to the absolute chronology established in Egypt. Kamares Ware is also employed in the construction of relative chronologies within Old Palace Crete, notably by Walberg who has fashioned a stylistically-based scheme from the Kamares vessels of Knossos and Phaistos, which she feels compensates for some of the stylistic inaccuracies of Evans' system:

Some of what he [Evans] classified as MM II A was stylistically identical with material that he had classed as MM I B, while other vases were stylistically identical with his MM II B material.69

This seems to overlook the distinct probability that in any given assemblage there may be elements that have continued unchanged from the previous period and other elements that will be present in the succeeding period, even though when taken as a whole each assemblage is inarguably of a distinct character. Within Kamares Ware there are undoubtedly changes from MM I B to II B, such as the rather vaguely defined trend towards 'naturalism'. Yet there are also major continuities which render the secure assignation of an assemblage to either MM I B, II A, or II B, on the basis of Kamares Ware stylistic criteria alone, fraught with difficulty. One might usefully refer to the complications that have arisen at Phaistos with regard particularly to the separation on stylistic grounds of Phase Ib from II.

It is clear that we must look to other categories of ware besides Kamares, only reasonable when one considers that it constitutes but a small percentage of all the pottery found in any one deposit. There is a good deal of fine ware that is not polychrome decorated or of eggshell fineness but which nonetheless is made with considerable skill and control. Some has already been recognized as being a valuable chronological indicator, such as the straight-sided cup with dark-on-light kidney stamps featured by Pendlebury in his 1939 volume.70 One might also note the breccia imitation hemispherical cups which are red washed with black and white veins in MM I B and buff with brown and white veining in MM II A. Consideration should also be given to the coarser vessels that are thrown from the hump, unsmoothed, and undecorated but for a cursory dark wash, vessels that one might describe as mass-produced. In this context a contribution by Fiandra is most relevant-small mass-produced cups and saucers from MM I A to MM III at Phaistos are seen to be rather precise chronological markers.7'

67 P. P. Betancourt, The History of Minoan Pottery (Princeton, I985).

"8 Walberg (n. 47), 126. "9 Ead. (n. 49). 7o Pendlebury (n. 9), pl. XXII: 3.I. Note there are

examples of this type in the sherd material of both the Royal Road South Upper Basement and the MM II A deposit P93/S.VII.5 recently excavated by Dr Colin Macdonald.

7' Fiandra (n. 44).

II2 CARL KNAPPETT

MacGillivray, on the basis of his work on the Old Palace Period pottery excavated by Evans, has identified a number of key ceramic features diagnostic of each period from MM I A to MM III A.72 The author has independently drawn up a similar (though far less extensive) array of features specifically for MM I B and MM II A, on the basis of the material from a number of more recently excavated deposits. Some of the important diagnostics of Knossos MM I B include handmade straight-sided cups with rough paring; small handmade straight- sided cups, with simple white-on-dark or polychrome decoration; handmade footed goblets with rough paring; wheel-made carinated cups with offset base; and red and black breccia decoration on fine straight-sided, carinated, and hemispherical cups.

Some key ceramic features of Knossos MM II A are flaring saucers, ledge-rim saucers, and 'teacups', all wheel-thrown, unsmoothed, and with a monochrome coat; these small utilitarian types are referred to by MacGillivray as 'Crude Ware.' One also finds plain wheel-made conical cups; dark-on-light kidney stamp decoration on fine straight-sided and hemispherical cups; and dark-on-light breccia with added white piping, decorating hemispherical cups. A few specific types continue from MM I B into MM II A, such as wheel-thrown footed goblets with black wash and a white band, and wheel-thrown carinated cups, unsmoothed and with a monochrome dark coat ('short-rimmed angular cup type 2' in MacGillivray's system). A number of other diagnostic types from MM I B and MM II A are detailed by MacGillivray (1998).

The criteria devised by MacGillivray find full support in the study independently executed by the author. When Evans's material from the Old Palace is subsequently reassessed, it soon becomes clear that there is a great deal of MM I B in Old Palace deposits, even if it is now often mixed with MM I A and/or MM II A pottery. In the West Wing of the Palace, it is reasonably well established that there is abundant material of MM I B date, following the soundings made by Hood73 in Early Magazines A and C. The Vat Room, for example, has certain vessels which are very probably MM I B in date (carinated cup; short red fabric tumbler imported from Kastelli; straight-sided cup, handmade with rough paring), but also material which is clearly MM I A (beaked jugs, i.e. Momigliano 1991: pl.25). A date of deposition in MM I B is a distinct possibility, albeit with a number of MM I A heirlooms, perhaps owing to the special nature of the deposit. Even further west, there is a major MM I B deposit from the Early Chamber Beneath the West Court.74 One might also refer to MM I B material (e.g. handmade short straight-sided cups with simple polychrome decoration) excavated by Hogarth and Welch in the area of the South-West House, and material of the same date from The Area of the Polychrome Jug in the North-West Treasury House (mixed with MM I A), and from the North-West Pit (mixed with MM II B and MM III A pottery).

In the East wing of the Palace the evidence for MM I B deposits has until now been

strikingly poor. Although predominantly MM II A and MM II B in date, there exists nevertheless, in the Stratigraphical Museum, pottery from the Loomweight Basement, the

Early Floor Beneath the Room of the Olive Press, and the South-West Room of the Royal Pottery Stores that is very similar stylistically to MM I B as identified elsewhere in and around the Palace. Although mixed up now, it is possible that there were separate MM I B and II A floor levels in the East Wing,75 and that Evans simply missed the stratigraphy due to the strong

72 MacGillivray (n. 56). 73 See AR 973-4 and I987-8.

74 Evans (n. 33), i86. 75 Cf. MacGillivray (n. 56).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY i

relief on this side of the palatial complex (in contrast to the more level West Wing). The thrust of this argument is that essentially there is a great deal of MM I B pottery from contexts throughout the Old Palace. The existence of pottery deposits in the East Wing as well as the West suggests that the Palace did indeed already exist and function in MM I B, even though its character architecturally remains elusive.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF FORMING TECHNOLOGY

Having placed a number of Knossian deposits within a relative chronology, we are in a position to embark upon a study of the temporal development of forming technology. Some work on this topic has already been carried out on Knossian material by Lewis,76 her main concern being to provide a Minoan background to her study of Early Mycenaean pottery manufacture in the Peloponnese. Although her contribution represents a rare and welcome use, in Aegean prehistory, of a systemic approach, there are problems with her remarks on the Knossos material. Firstly, there is no study of MM II B material from Knossos, possibly due to problems of definition in the mid-I980s when much of what is now called MM II B was then being assigned to MM III A. Secondly, there are some fundamental problems of a methodological nature. For instance, there is no explicit statement that the potter throwing on the wheel needs to attain considerable control before he can contemplate throwing larger vessels. By choosing to create functional/shape categories such as 'cooking pot', 'jugs and jars', and 'conical cups', Lewis fails to take account of the influence of size upon the choice of forming technique, particularly in scenarios when the use of rapid wheel rotation is fairly new. Furthermore, there is a rather simplistic dualism between 'handbuilt' and 'wheel-thrown', with none of the material attributed to combination methods such as coiling and wheel- throwing, or coiling and wheel-shaping.77 Lastly, the idea that the wheel can be used both skilfully and unskilfully is not adequately embraced.

METHODOLOGY

These shortcomings can be remedied with a few basic points. I rely on detailed visual examination of macroscopic surface traces that relate to the forming processes used by the potter. A particular focus on the interior lower body is most useful, but all body parts should be taken into account wherever possible. This form of analysis can be extremely fruitful, given a basic understanding of the logic of forming processes. Such understanding is not very prevalent in archaeology however, perhaps because within the dominant typological approach greater weight is placed on the description rather than on the explanation of ceramic shapes.78 This has meant that archaeologists are insufficiently aware of the active forming processes responsible for the bringing forth of a specific shape. A major tenet of Franken's 'techno-analytical' approach is that there is much cultural information to be reaped from reconstructing forming techniques. Such a perspective can be especially valuable in a period such as Middle Minoan I-II, which sees the introduction of the wheel technique.

76 H. B. Lewis, The Manufacture of Early Mycenaean Pottery (Ph.D. thesis, University of Minnesota, 1983).

77 Even though in her chapter on the ethnography of pottery making she includes a section on 'Hand and Wheel Combination Methods', in her thesis there is no further

consideration given to the methodology one might require for the identification of such processes from the finished products alone.

78 H. J. Franken, 'Analysis of methods of potmaking in archaeology', Harvard Theological Review, 64 (197i), 227-55.

i4 CARL KNAPPETT

Two fundamental points help us to grasp the problems surrounding wheel techniques. Firstly, the skill of wheel-throwing is very difficult to attain, and (especially on an unstable wheel) it is not uncommon for potters to require a ten-year apprenticeship before the technique is mastered.79 It would therefore seem improbable that there could ever be a simple switch from hand-building to wheel-throwing. The second key point is best expressed by Foster in his work on contemporary Mexican potters:

Pottery-making is most accurately thought of as a continuum from hand-modelling to full exploitation of the wheel, with innumerable intermediate gradations.8so

The possibility of intermediate techniques could have interesting implications for our approach to the development of forming technology in Minoan Crete. There follows a description of some of these techniques, as well as coil-building and full wheel-throwing, and the ways in which we might identify them from surface traces.

In terms of forming a shape from clay, the first dividing principle is that to rearrange clay particles one must either apply pressure to the clay, or dissolve it into a suspension.8' The latter only applies to the technique of casting into a hygroscopic mould, whilst the former is relevant to all other techniques such as pinching, coiling, slabbing, and throwing. Van der Leeuw's second principle involves distinguishing between those techniques in which the pressure is applied continually, and those in which it is applied intermittently.82 The technique most obviously creating continuous pressure upon the clay paste is wheel- throwing. Although on all those occasions when continuous pressure is applied we may accurately refer to the process as 'throwing', this process need not occur on the true wheel. It will emerge that a conceptual separation of the wheel technique and the wheel device becomes very useful.83

1. COIL-BUILDING

(a) Technique Rolls of uniform thickness are made by rolling the clay vertically between the hands, or horizontally on a flat surface. A roll is placed around the circumference of the vessel, and gradually the walls are built up by placing coil upon coil, producing a grooved and ridged surface that is made regular through smearing, scraping, and smoothing. Although a single long coil, or a set of shorter ones, can be used to build the vessel wall up in a continuous spiral, a more common technique is to add coils in an annular series. Whichever technique is used, the potter will face the same sorts of constructional problems, clearly identified by van der Leeuw in his study on Neolithic Beakers from the Netherlands.84 There will be a tendency for lower walls to sag owing to gravity, the weight of the upper walls, and the pressure applied by the potter, and a tendency towards splaying, i.e. an increase in circumference, due also to the application of pressure. The potter has to counteract these natural tendencies, and van der Leeuw notes that different solutions are possible. One solution is to leave the vessel wall thick

79 Roux and Corbetta (n. 2). 5o Foster I959b (n. 7), 102.

8' S. E. van der Leeuw, Studies in the Technology of Ancient

Pottery (Amsterdam, I976).

8 Id, (n. 81), 239. 83 Cf. Foster 1959a, I959b (n. 7). 84 Van der Leeuw (n. 81), 329-37.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 5

during construction. However, leaving thick walls means that drying will be slow and will perhaps lead to uneven shrinkage, tension in the paste, and a strong chance of cracks developing, if not in drying then almost certainly in firing. Thus it is beneficial to thin the walls before drying is completed. Thinning necessitates scraping, a process that can only occur when the vessel has been left to dry a little, thereby leaving rough traces on the exterior surface (unless the vessel is wide enough for this to be executed at the interior). The potter may well prefer to take the risk of constructing the vessel with thin walls to begin with, to avoid this scraping process and the rough traces it leaves. The potter can then combat the tendency towards sagging and splaying in three ways:

I. by using an external support, for example wrapping string around the exterior walls. 2. by making each coil shorter than the last, and attaching it slightly to the interior of the underlying coil rather than directly on top. This compensates against the tendency for the vessel circumference to increase.

3. by joining the new coil onto the existing one in a particular way: the thumb at the interior smears the paste down, and the fingers at the exterior smear the paste up. The coil joins, when sectioned vertically, appear diagonal.

Franken and Kalsbeek85 make the fundamental point that with coiling, 'turning is not completely excluded, since these pots are usually made on a loose base which can be rotated'.86 But no matter how easy the rotation, it will never overcome the friction caused by squeezing the wall. Only those movements not creating such braking, such as smoothing the walls or turning the lip, which can be performed with one hand, may utilise rotation in a different way.a7

(b) Identification Coil-built pottery may have walls of uneven thickness, sometimes twice as thick in some parts as in others. The vessel will generally be asymmetrical in shape, although rotation- finishing may help to increase symmetry to some degree. If the coil-built vessel has been rotation finished, there may be horizontal striations around the upper body and rim, it having been smoothed with a cloth in a turning movement, though these striations will be discontinuous and should be easily distinguished from the striations left by throwing or wheel-finishing. If the pot has been properly finished all traces of coil joins will have been obliterated, but even on well-made vessels some trace usually remains, particularly in areas that the potter may have found it hard to reach, such as the underside of shoulders and necks. On less well-made vessels, or where the shape is such that the potter is not easily able to reach all areas, traces of coil joins should be more conspicuous. Mention is also made by Rye88 of distinctive fracture patterns associated with the coil-building technique, but the present author concurs with Roux and Courty89 in doubting the usefulness of this class of data, as so many other taphonomic processes affect fracture and breakage, factors for which one cannot control.

05 H.J. Franken and E Kalsbeek, Potters of a Medieval Village in the Jordan Valley (Amsterdam, 1975).

86 Ibid, 38. 87 This point is also made by Arnold and Bourriau (n. 12).

8 O. S. Rye, Pottery Technology: Principles and Reconstruction (Washington DC, I98I).

"9 Roux and Courty (n. 16).

116 CARL KNAPPETT

2. THROWING

(a) Technique In her invaluable volume on pottery analysis,90 Rice opens the section on wheel-throwing with the assertion, 'throwing is done on a potter's wheel' (p. I28). As hinted at above, this should be followed by the rejoinder, 'but need not always be'. We need to be very careful about what we mean by 'throwing'. It is often considered as a process that occurs only on the true wheel, and indeed this is almost always the case. Using 'rotative kinetic energy',9' the potter creates a hollow with his fingers in a centred body of clay and proceeds to draw up the walls to the desired height (more details follow below). However, it is important to be aware that there is not an exclusive relationship between the device and the process; throwing can occur on a non-wheel device, and a wheel device is not always used for wheel-throwing. Arnold and Bourriau92 claim that Egyptian potters were able to rotate a turntable at speeds equivalent to that obtained by a wheel to draw up the walls of pots. Rather than keeping the process and the device conceptually separate, the authors then call this device a 'simple wheel'. If indeed Egyptian potters were capable of such a feat and if they were I suspect it would have been only with small vessels then one might say that they were wheel-throwing using a turntable: throwing does not have to occur on a wheel. Yet the process of drawing up the vessel walls of a pot requires a momentum, velocity, and stability usually only attainable on a true wheel. I suggest that a true wheel is one capable of rotating under its own momentum, using the flywheel effect, allowing the potter to use both hands for shaping the vessel. Neither the 'low simple wheel' or the 'tall-stemmed simple wheel' described by Arnold and Bourriau seem capable of this, although the 'extra-low simple wheel' and the kickwheel would both have provided sufficient continuous momentum.

Franken and Kalsbeek93 divide the throwing process into a series of consecutive steps. A certain quantity of clay is placed on the wheel; unless the potter is throwing 'from the cone',94 the quantity will depend upon the size of the pot to be made. To securely attach the clay to the wheel, Rye (1981) notes that both clay and wheelhead must not be too wet as when pressure is applied the clay mass will become unstuck. Once secured, the clay and the hands must be frequently moistened as the clay lump is centred; clay in a wet state reduces friction and thus also the tendency towards braking. Centring requires a good deal of pressure from both hands, 'in such a way that the ball revolves concentrically with the axis of rotation of the wheel'.95 The potter must then make a hole in the middle of the centred lump, a process known as 'opening', by pressing firmly downwards in the direction of the wheelhead. Depending on the size of the lump, one thumb, two thumbs, or even a whole fist can be used.96 The next operation is the lifting of the clay, which can be done with one hand. With the thumb on the interior and fingers at the exterior, the potter pinches the clay to reduce its thickness, and then moves his hand gradually upwards as he pinches so that the excess clay is lifted up and can be used to heighten the wall. If he wants to increase circumference, to

90 P. M. Rice, Pottery Analysis: A Sourcebook (Chicago, 1987). 9' Term coined by Roux and Courty (n. 16). 92 Arnold and Bourriau (n. 12).

93 Franken and Kalsbeek (n. 85). 94 In this process a large body of clay is centred, more

than is needed for a single vessel. The first vessel is thrown, and is removed from the remaining body of

centred clay with a knife or string. The potter then

proceeds to throw a second vessel from the centred clay, and so on, depending on the quantity of clay on the wheel. Thus technique is alternatively known as throwing 'from the hump'.

t5 Rye (n. 88), 74. 9" For more detail see Franken and Kalsbeek (n. 85), 32-3.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY i7

fashion a bowl for example, this is naturally achieved. But to pull the walls vertically is more of a challenge, and the potter may have to use his other hand to press from the other side, to counteract the tendency towards an increase in circumference. If the potter is particularly skilled he may be able to lift the clay and achieve the final shape in the same operation. However, more normally some additional shaping and thinning is required. If the potter has thrown a form with walls higher than the very slight depth he can reach between thumb and fingers, he will have to use both hands for this procedure (indeed, potters may well use both hands to throw from the start, not just in this shaping stage). Thus the wall will be thrown between the fingertips of one hand on the inside and the other hand on the outside (this will produce grooves inside and out, whilst with one-handed throwing the grooves will be left only by the thumb on the inside).

Franken and Kalsbeek go into further detail by differentiating four ways of throwing a pot, namely: completely right side up; first part right side up, second part upside-down; completely upside-down; first part upside-down, second part right side up. Many of these options are not strictly relevant to our particular situation, as they are suited to the construction of round- bottomed vessels, nearly totally absent from Middle Minoan assemblages. These different options, however, do alert us to the various possibilities that archaeologists might not normally consider.

(b) Identification Roux and Courty97 summarize the surface features that have been used by archaeologists to identify wheel-thrown products: horizontal striations known as rilling; concentric striations on the underside of vessels; ripples on inner walls due to compression operations; specific modes of fracture. They stress that all these features may be associated with other techniques besides wheel- throwing, particularly techniques which involve the fast-rotating wheel as a secondary procedure.

It may be that there are other methods of identification of which these authors do not take account. For example, van der Leeuw98 notes that there will be deep grooves from the fingers particularly at the interior lower body, while the potter was lifting the greatest quantity of paste. These grooves should become less deep towards the upper body, but if there is a rounded and incurving shoulder here the traces may also be rather deep. Many wheel-thrown vessels are inverted and shaved on the wheel, and this should certainly leave tell-tale surface traces on the exterior lower body. As shaving occurs once the vessel has been allowed to dry a little, the hard-edged tool that is used may catch small grains and leave deepish horizontal grooves. One might also note that if a round-bottomed vessel has been thrown upside down, i.e. from rim to base, there will be a characteristic whirl at the interior base.99 Van der Leeuw has useful comments on identifying speed and momentum of a wheel in the finished product in his work on Haarlem pottery.'o0

3. INTERMEDIATE TECHNIQUE-'HANDMADE AND THROWN'

(a) Technique

A further aspect of throwing brought up by van der Leeuw is that products may be thrown from more than one lump or roll of paste. This appears to correspond to what Franken and

97 Roux and Courty (n. 16). 98 S. E. van der Leeuw, 'The pottery from a Middle-Uruk

dump at Tepe Sharafabad, Iran. A technological study' (n.d.).

99 Id ( n. 8I). 0oo Ibid. 125.

i8 CARL KNAPPETT

Kalsbeek refer to as 'handmade and thrown pottery'.'o' Van der Leeuw mentions in a more recent contributionio2 that throwing in coils is rather common around the Eastern Mediterranean from the Bronze Age onwards. Basically the potter will throw a roll of clay that has been attached to the wheel or to a slab base, make a groove in the top of the wall thus attained, leave it to dry a little, and then secure another coil of clay on top of the existing vessel wall. This added coil will also be thrown, and perhaps a further coil, until the required wall height is reached. A comparable technique of throwing with coils, starting from a base mould, is documented in North-West Frontier Province, Pakistan, by Rye and Evans.'0s Franken and Kalsbeek assert that the technique demands much less from the clay and from the wheel, although they fail to explain why. Presumably not needing to centre a mass of clay means that the clay need not be so moist, the walls not having to be pulled all the way up from the base would also make this process less demanding on the clay than full wheel-throwing. Moreover, it may be true that not needing to centre a clay mass is less demanding of a wheel device because it is this operation that requires the greatest wheel velocity.

(b) Identification As far as the technique 'handmade and thrown' is concerned, there may not be any sure way of distinguishing it, on the basis of surface traces, from full throwing. It may on occasion be possible to identify an area of the vessel wall where an additional coil was added to be thrown, and this does appear to be the case with some Thrapsano 'flowerpots' thrown in coils on the kickwheel. This is an area that requires further research.

4. INTERMEDIATE TECHNIQUE-'SEMI-THROWN' (COILED AND WHEEL-SHAPED)

(a) Technique This technique is not covered by Franken and Kalsbeek, and indeed the term 'semi- thrown' seems to have been coined only recently by van der Leeuw.'o5 For this technique the potter must add a coil to the base or wall, rotate the vessel on its support, apply one hand with a tool or 'rib' to the inside and the other hand to the outside (this outside hand

keeps the ensemble of vessel and support rotating by moving the vessel rather than the support itself), and shape the wall between the rib and the other hand. The potter does not exactly draw up the vessel walls, as with the throwing technique, although this effect may become more pronounced towards the neck and rim. It must be stressed that the semi- thrown technique, which we might also label 'coil-built and wheel-shaped', does not make full use of the wheel, and it could well be achieved on a pivoted turntable or 'tournette'. Some 12th Dynasty vessels that Arnold and Bourriau claim were wheel-thrown on the

simple low wheel may actually only have been coil-built and wheel-shaped, judging by the surface marks that can be 'shallow, unevenly spaced, sometimes overlapping each other, or

discontinuous'.

Io' Franken and Kalsbeek (n. 85), '43. 1o2 S. E. van der Leeuw, 'Giving the potter a choice:

conceptual aspects of pottery techniques', in Lemonnier (n. 5), 238-88.

o03 0. S. Rye and C. Evans, 'Traditional pottery techniques

of Pakistan: field and laboratory studies', Smithsonian Contributions to Anthropology, 21 (Washington DC, I976).

io4 As noted by Foster I959a, i959b (n. 7). 0o5 Van der Leeuw (n. 98). "o' Arnold and Bourriau (n. 12), 53; and fig. 57.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY i

(b) Identifcation Roux and Courty observe that certain parts of the vessel may retain traces that give the impression of wheel-throwing, whilst other parts seem more consistent with a technique of coil-building. Van der Leeuw points out that when the semi-thrown technique involves the use of a rib at the interior wall, the traces left by it will be deep, indicating that the clay was moist at the time. At the base of the vessel the rib marks will tend to be diagonal and erratic, the rib having been used to remove excess paste. At the upper body the rib traces will tend to become more horizontal and regular, as the rib has here been used in original shaping processes during wheel rotation. Van der Leeuw contrasts this to the traces left when a vessel has been coiled and rotation-finished. With this technique, scraping of the vessel occurs when the vessel has dried somewhat, and so the traces are less deep.

THE KNOSSIAN MATERIAL

The main criterion used in classifying the material from each period will be the size of the vessel. Size will be evaluated primarily according to the height of the vessel, as it is with increasing height in particular that the apprentice potter at the wheel experiences the most difficulties. This relationship between vessel height and throwing difficulty has been revealed in an ethnographic and experimental study by Roux and Corbetta.'o7 They differentiate between a number of apprenticeship stages, with the ultimate one attained by adults being the throwing of flower-pots 30 cm in height (Stage 3). The next stage down (Substage 2B) involves the manufacture of flower pots 20 cm high, which comes after the throwing of 10 cm high vessels (Substage 2A). Stage I requires only that fairy lamps be thrown; this process does not even require the lump of clay to be centred, as the forms to be made are so small (less than 5 cm high). Once at stage 2, however, the potter must know how to centre a clay mass. With these observations in mind we can construct three broad categories of 'small' (mainly cups), 'medium' (e.g. beaked jugs, bridge-spouted jars), and 'medium-large' (amphorae, storage jars). 'Small' will not correspond to the Stage I above (as this stage does not seem to be represented in the assemblages), but to the Stage 2A, i.e. the throwing of vessels of about Io cm high. 'Medium' will refer to vessels of c. 20 cm high, and thus tallies with Roux and Corbetta's Stage 2B. A number of Middle Minoan vessels at Knossos fall in between these stages, being around 15 cm in height; we may refer to these as 'small-medium' on occasion in the text that follows. Our category of 'medium-large' includes vessels above 30 cm in height, and up to about 50 cm (anything larger is 'large', but will tend not to be included in this study, as there is little chance of them ever being wheel-thrown). It is equivalent to Stage 3 in the above system.

In this way we can identify the manufacturing techniques chosen by potters for vessels requiring different levels of skill and control, and how the technological options available to Minoan potters are transformed by the first extensive use of the wheel to throw certain sorts of pots in MM I B.

MIDDLE MINOAN I A

Beginning with MM I A, represented in this study by the RRS 'Rubbish Levels' that are stratigraphically beneath the Basement Floors,1o8 it is evident that some vessels may be coil-

,o7 Roux and Corbetta (n. 2). 0o8 Hood (n. 40).

120 CARL KNAPPETT

built and rotation-finished, although nothing is truly wheel-thrown, or even wheel-shaped for that matter. Come late MM I A, represented by the Lower Basement of RRS, some footed goblets show tooling marks at the interior base that are rather ambiguous; experimental research may reveal what such marks signify, but for the moment they are puzzling. Their position at the interior lower body makes it hard to see how they could possibly be associated with incipient wheel-throwing. Two small jars with footed bases (RRS--PI3o, P4o07), decorated in the polychrome geometric style,'09 are both clearly handmade. Another small vessel, a wide-based baggy-shaped jar or bowl (RRS--P4o6) is also clearly late MM I A judging by its polychrome geometric decoration (and of course its secure stratigraphic context). It is by no means wheel-thrown, but certain surface traces at the interior suggest the use of a rib, in combination with some degree of continuous rotation, to help thin the walls (PLATE I6 a). As rotative kinetic energy seems not to have been used to actually draw up the walls, we must classify this as coiled and wheel-shaped, or even just rotation finished. Another small jar (PLATE 16 b), from the same late MM I A context, is clearly wheel-thrown, and is the only such example of this date in the material examined. It is almost complete and thus it is probably not simply an intrusion from later levels. Also notable is its fabric, a semi-coarse deep red that is most likely an import from the Kastelli Pediadha region."o It would be most interesting if this small carinated bridge-spouted jar with decoration of thin white vertical lines, and so clearly wheel-thrown with its parallel striations at the base and deep, regular rilling at the interior (PLATE I6 c), could actually be shown to be not only one of the earliest examples at Knossos, and indeed in Crete, of a clearly wheel-thrown vessel, but also an import to the site from a 'provincial' area."'

Medium-sized vessels in this period reveal no sign whatsoever of being manufactured using wheel technology--indeed, one tall carinated bridge-spouted jar (RRS-P323) shows not even the slightest indication of rotation finishing, with wiping marks in all directions and coil seams visible at the interior upper body. Needless to say, any larger vessels are unlikely to contradict this picture. In summary, the only evidence for wheel-throwing in the late Prepalatial period comes in the form of a very limited number of footed goblets,"' and the small jar in a Pedhiadha red fabric discussed above. Such scraps of evidence are not sufficient basis for claiming that the technique had any sort of an impact either earlier or later within MM I A. Neither are there clear signs of the consistent use of intermediate techniques such as coiling and wheel-shaping, which might be indicative of a gradual transition to wheel-throwing as suggested by Roux and Courty"3 for Near Eastern contexts in the third millennium BC. It is not doubted that there existed the technique of coil-building with rotation finishing as far back as EM II B, as evidenced in the material from Fournou Korifi (Whitelaw pers. comm.), and

suggested by the turntables from the same site."4 Although the existence of rotation-finishing may certainly predispose potters conceptually"5 to the technique of wheel-throwing, rotation- finishing by no means predetermines the eventual and inevitable adoption of wheel-throwing. An obvious criticism of this type of evolutionary perspective is to ask why the wheel innovation

',9 MacGillivray (n. 6) has argued convincingly that this style is a late MM I A feature.

no This is based on macroscopic comparisons rather than petrographic examination.

"' Sinclair Hood has isolated a handful of sherds from the MM I A Rubbish Levels of the Royal Road South that may be wheel-thrown. It is of considerable interest that they are

all in the same 'Pedhiadha red' fabric. 1"' Day et al. (n. '7), 278. "3 Roux and Courty (n. 16). "4 Warren (n. 15). 115 i.e. in terms of their cognitive mappa mundi; cf. van der

Leeuw (n. 102).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY I21

did not occur earlier than it did, if indeed 'it was a simple step to put a hole in a turntable and fix a spindle'."' Warren subsequently implies that the ease with which this step could have occurred renders the hypothesis of independent invention feasible. But although the device may be easily constructed, the technique is not so readily acquired, no matter how long the tradition in rotation-finishing.

MIDDLE MINOAN I B

Moving from the Prepalatial to the earliest Protopalatial period, i.e. Middle Minoan I B, it is now, according to the traditionally accepted view, that we should expect to see substantial evidence for the widespread introduction of wheel-throwing technology. Whilst this view is broadly correct, the data from Knossos point to a more complex picture, with the wheel only being used to throw a very restricted range of vessels: some carinated cups and straight-sided cups are already approaching eggshell fineness and are very well thrown and finished, whilst others have less time invested in the final stages yet are nonetheless skilfully wheel-thrown, such as short-rimmed angular cups from Early Magazines A and C, and the footed goblets with dark wash and a white band below the rim (note that although the main body is competently wheel-made, the foot is attached separately in rather haphazard fashion). Nonetheless, coil-building for small vessels remains a very common technique in MM I B, and hand-built small vessels may even outnumber wheel-thrown ones in this period. Squat straight-sided cups with a black wash and simple polychrome bands are very well-smoothed, a process which has tended to obliterate forming traces, but one can still see some irregularities in wall thickness, and even what appear to be coil joins in the break (PLATE 17 a). Another straight-sided cup type, with very rough surfaces, thick walls and marks from heavy paring, and sometimes with a very messy red slip, appears to be coil-built, again hinted at by possible coil seams in the break (PLATE 17 b). However, the considerable paring that seems to have taken place is not generally consistent with a coil-building technique, in which one can modify wall thickness as one builds coil upon coil, rather than having to wait until a subsequent stage and waste time in paring. This suggests the possibility of a different manufacturing technique, involving unskilled use of the wheel."7 The potter(s) involved will have experienced great difficulties pulling the paste up between the fingers, and actually solved this inadequacy by pushing down into the clay lump rather than pulling it up (assuming its successful centring in the first place, not an easy task in itself). This then entailed the need remove from the wheel a form with extremely thick walls, and scrape away at the exterior in order to thin the walls down to a reasonable size. The straight-sided cup that results has major paring marks to the exterior that one would not normally associate with wheel-throwing."8 Yet other types are more clearly hand-built, such as the untreated footed goblet"9 (PLATE 17 c), whilst some miniature jugs and cups (less than 5 cm high) are very scrappily made, seemingly hand-built with a single spiralling coil (PLATES I8 a, 18 b), and barely smoothed thereafter (PLATE 18 c). The technical competence of these vessels is so low that one wonders how it was decided that

"7 Warren (n. 15), 226. "7 I would like to thank Sander van der Leeuw for alerting

me to this alternative. "~8 Lewis (n. 76) states that 'Ethnographic examples show

that scraping is a procedure used only with hand-built pottery'

On the contrary, wheel-throwing often lacks the control of skilled hand-building, and scraping, particularly of the lower body, can be necessary (van der Leeuw pers. comm.).

"9 Also present in the Early West Magazines in some quantities.

122 CARL KNAPPETT

it was worthwhile firing them, and indeed how they survived the firing process at all.12o Whereas one might expect in this period to see certain potters struggling with the new technique, and others showing considerable skill in the established technique, paradoxically the reverse seems to be the case. Explaining this dynamic may prove to be particularly challenging.

In the same period, the wheel-throwing technique is not commonly extended to vessels of medium size. Some beaked jugs are wheel-thrown up to the lower shoulder, at which point coils are used, with little rotation finishing, to build the vessel up to the neck and spout (PLATE 19 a). The question arises as to why these vessels were not thrown up to a higher point, for example as far as the collar; to answer this we must consider the constructional problems the potter may have faced at this part of the shape. The beaked jug has a highly in-curving shoulder that may have been prone to sagging, even more so with the added weight of the neck and spout bearing down upon it. For wheel-throwing the clay has to be much wetter than for coil-building, and so throwing this part of the shape would increase the likelihood of sagging. In Middle Minoan I B potters may have chosen to combat this problem by wheel-throwing and then stopping at that point where the shoulder starts to curve in dramatically. The pre-form thus far attained is left to dry a little, before coils are used for the construction of the problematic shoulder area, the collar and the neck. It may be that the coils are in a slightly coarser fabric than the wheel- thrown part, to overcome the problems of differential drying rates.

Another technique is observed in the construction of bridge-spouted jars of medium and small-medium size. It is worth noting initially that we are dealing with a small sample and so it is difficult to say if this technique is characteristic of the period. Relatively deep and tightly packed rilling at the interior of some vessels (RRS P4o5, P4oI) seems to have been made by a rib or other sharp-edged tool when the clay was still wet (PLATE 19 b). It is likely that here we see wheel-throwing with the use of a rib at the interior to help draw up and thin the walls. A rib exerts pressure over a more limited area than the fingers, and as a result there is less friction and rotation continues for longer. Thus rib use in wheel-throwing can sometimes be an adaptation to insufficient rotative kinetic energy, itself due in part to imperfect wheel technology, certainly possible in MM I B. It is also possible that a coil-built form was created first, which was then thinned and shaped on a wheel using a rib at the interior. Another type that may have been created with the use of the rib and the wheel is the carinated bridge- spouted jar (with thin walls, black wash, polychrome stripes) as seen in The Early Chamber Beneath the West Court, and Early West Magazines A and C, and also the unique conical goblet of eggshell fineness from the latter deposit.

As with the small vessels, a great many, (and perhaps the majority of) medium-sized types in MM I B continue to be coil-built, with or without rotation finishing. All medium-large vessels without exception are coil-built, many without any discernible rotational aid.

MIDDLE MINOAN II A

In MM II A there are not such varied technological responses to problems encountered in

fashioning small vessels. Nearly all are wheel-made and effectively so. In this period we see the full development of the very fine eggshell ware, probably wheel-thrown with the help of sharp-

12o Such variation in technological knowledge within the

same site in the same period is staggering, and the implications for the character of workshop organization are

profound.

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 123

edged tools for shaving; not all wheel-thrown pottery of the period reaches this level of skill and control, but then not all potters had such aims. Many of the small vessels are thrown from the hump and are ready to be fired after a cursory dip in a dark wash and a period of drying. MacGillivray (1998) implies that this class of vessels, for which he favours the term 'crude', is the only one in which this technology of throwing from the hump is put to use; I would suggest, however, that many other non-crude forms are also thrown in this way--it is simply that they are thereafter subjected to those primary finishing processes of scraping and smoothing that tend to obscure the initial forming process (e.g. PLATES 20 c, 20 d). This notwithstanding, the crude class bursts onto the scene in MM II A almost as suddenly as the ill-fashioned hand-built vessels of MM I B disappear. For the function they were designed to serve and given the aims of the potters one can still say that these 'mass-produced' wares are skilfully made, with little indication that there were any serious constructional difficulties encountered.

As soon as height and thus throwing difficulty increases, we see a much wider range of technological response. As in MM I B, some medium-sized beaked jugs are wheel-thrown, but the method of dealing with the constructional problems posed by the shoulder area seems to have altered slightly. Now potters have the confidence with the clay on the wheel to throw the entire shoulder as far as the collar; thereafter it is simply a matter of inserting a separately constructed neck and spout once the clay has dried sufficiently to support the weight. Some very fine bridge-spouted jars from the Royal Pottery Stores'2' are skilfully wheel-thrown, with nothing to suggest the use of a rib. The possibility remains that such vessels were not fully wheel-thrown, but coiled and thrown, that is thrown up to a certain height, at which point another coil is added which in turn is drawn up a certain amount, and so on. At this time the methodological basis for differentiating coiled and thrown from fully thrown is not established, relying as it does on the slim chance that one might detect faint coil seams or changes in body thickness at a particular horizontal zone of the mid-body. The application of xero- radiographic techniques in the future may help resolve this issue.

Some bridge-spouted jars with a conical profile and a small carination are poorly wheel- thrown (PLATE 22 a); the potters evidently had problems drawing up the clay paste at the lower body, and sagging may also have complicated matters.

Nonetheless, less than half of medium-sized vessels in MM II A are wheel-thrown, and the figure may be as low as one quarter, although these are only gross estimates, given the selected nature of many of the deposits. Of the complete medium-sized vessels that have recently come to light in areas SVII 5 and 8 to the south-west of the palace, only three are fully wheel- thrown, including a beaked jug (P472: PLATES 21 a, 21 b) and a bridge-spouted jar (P348: PLATE 21 c). It is also potentially significant that these few wheel-thrown medium-sized vessels are in a fine to semi-fine buff fabric, and have a dark wash with white-on-dark decoration. Clearly the bridge-spouted jars from the Royal Pottery Stores are also in a fine buff with impressive polychrome decoration. It is not difficult to see a possible link between the elite demand for fine tablewares and the use of the wheel-throwing technique. Is it that the elites of Knossos sponsored only the best craftsmen to supply their needs, and that only the best had already learnt how to extend the wheel-throwing technique to larger vessels? Many of the other beaked jugs and bridge-spouted jars, in various fabrics many of which may well be non-local,

12, See MacGillivray (n. 6).

I24 CARL KNAPPETT

are coil-built with varying degrees of rotation finishing (P450), some possibly approaching wheel-shaping, whilst others show no traces whatsoever of any rotational aid in construction'22 (PLATES 19 c, 20 a, and 20 b). The generally coarser fabrics of such shapes,'3 and the lack of anything but the simplest decoration on the majority of them, mean that they can hardly be labelled 'fine tablewares'. This possible link between the early skilled use of wheel-throwing and social differentiation merits further investigation in the future.

When one considers that in this period nearly all small vessels are wheel-thrown, the continued coil-building of many medium vessels means that numerous potters were not yet at a stage where they could consistently throw vessel walls above a certain height. In the terms of Roux and Corbetta, it is as if in MM I B only some potters had reached a stage equivalent to '2A', that is the throwing of vessels c. Io cm in height. By MM II A nearly all potters have reached this stage, but only a limited number have actually reached stage '2B', the throwing of vessels c. 20 cm in height. It is perhaps only in MM II B (which we shall come to), that the majority of potters could actually be said to be proficient in stage 2B. Moreover, the wide range of technological variants at any one point in time vis i vis manufacturing procedure, from skilful wheel-throwing, through unskilful throwing, to skilled coil-building with rotation finishing, indicates a variety of production modes, strategies and traditions in the Knossos area. Finally, Lewis' notion that 'manufacturing processes used during MM II A changed little from MM IB'"4 can hardly be upheld.

As far as MM II B is concerned, it seems that we should defer to the weight of evidence from Quartier Mu and Myrtos Pyrgos.'"5 This toing and froing between Knossos and east Crete is excusable due to the widespread sharing (geographically if not socially) of basic technological knowledge. It is also to some extent forced upon us by the rather limited nature of the Knossos MM II B material. MacGillivray describes the problems with the palace material of admixture with MM III A levels;I26 as for one of the few clear stratigraphic contexts (from outside the palace), Trial KV, excavated and published by Popham,'27 the majority of the pottery consists of small vessels (cups, crude bowls), with only very few medium sized (and larger) vessels present. Unsurprisingly, small vessels continue to be proficiently wheel-made. From the publication, the medium-sized bridge-spouted jar P3 (Popham 1974, pl. 29 a) is almost certainly wheel-thrown (although it might be coiled and thrown). The construction technique used for the bridge-spouted jar P4 (Popham 1974, pl. 29 g) is less conspicuous from the publication, as is the case with the other medium and medium-large sized vessels on pl. 29 (Popham 1974). Further research in Heraklion Museum, where these vases are now stored, would be necessary for conclusive assessment. Judging from the Quartier Mu and Myrtos Pyrgos material, many medium-sized vessels are wheel-thrown or coiled and thrown in this period, but no medium-large vessels such as amphorae are in any way thrown. Some, however, do show signs of having been coiled and wheel-shaped, although the secure identification of such intermediate techniques is fraught with difficulty.

122 As in MM I B, all moderately-large vessels are coil- built, perhaps with some rotational aid.

'3 For more examples from this period of medium and medium-large vessels that are coil-built with no rotational aid, c.f. PLATES 22 d, 23 a, and 23 d, which can be contrasted with the wheel-thrown medium jar in PLATES 23 b and 23 c.

124 Lewis (n. 76), 73. "25 C. J. Knappett, Ceramic Production and Distribution in

Protopalatial Crete: Technological, Economic, and Social Perspectives (Ph.D. thesis, Cambridge, 1997)

26 MacGillivray (n. 6). 127 Popham (n. 65).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 125

How the technological situation develops in MM III A is not at all clear at this stage of research. As with Trial KV, much of the material from the Acropolis HousesI28 of relevant size, i.e. medium to medium-large, is now stored in Heraklion Museum. It is hoped that in the future this material too will form part of a more detailed project on innovations in wheel technology from MM I onwards, hopefully embracing other sites in the process.

Our main objective accomplished, of showing the lead up to MM II B in terms of pottery construction innovations, we may briefly summarise what happens after MM II B in forming technology, despite our lack of certain details. By MM III B-LM I A, even some medium-large vessels are wheel-thrown, almost certainly using the coiled and thrown technique (PLATE 22 C). There still exist some vessels, even of medium size, that are coil-built: one rather striking example is the piriform jar with Linear A inscription from an MM III B/LM I A deposit on the Acropolis Hill'29 (PLATE 22 b). By the LM I B destruction of Myrtos Pyrgos, for example, many medium-large vessels and medium vessels alike are wheel-thrown. At this stage of research it is unclear if this technological state of affairs may in fact have been reached already in the mature LM I A period, since Lewis claims that by mature LM I A nearly all vessels are wheel-thrown.

STEPS IN INTERPRETATION

At present there is only limited evidence from the Prepalatial period for a gradual development: although unpivoted turntables were being extremely skilfully used already by EM II B, there does not appear to be any consistent use of wheel-throwing before MM I B. Neither is there any evidence for the progressive use of intermediate techniques in the periods leading up to full wheel-throwing, such as has been observed in Near Eastern contexts.'s3 Although the existence of rotation-finishing may certainly predispose potters conceptually to the technique of wheel-throwing,'3' rotation-finishing by no means predetermines the eventual and inevitable adoption of wheel-throwing.

There is a second key aspect of the evidence preventing us from arguing for an inexorable local evolution of technique. The first wheel-made vessels at Knossos in MM I B betray a considerable mastery over the technique by certain potters, with few signs of a difficult period of apprenticeship. With regard to the development of wheel-throwing, it is not, as Warren states, merely 'a simple step to put a hole in a turntable and fix a spindle.' It may be a simple step to create a wheel device, but it is anything but a simple step to acquire the technique. It can take many years of apprenticeship before competence, let alone mastery, is achieved in the wheel technique.'32 How could this expertise with the wheel have been so suddenly acquired by certain Minoan potters? The artisans must have been directly involved at some critical stage of the process, owing to the complex technical skill required in wheel-throwing.'ss33 It is unlikely that it was a case of an elite leader simply bringing back the 'idea' of the wheel from

28 H. W. Catling, E. A. Catling, and D. Smyth, 'Knossos 1975: Middle Minoan III and Late Minoan I Houses by the Acropolis', BSA 74 (I979), I-80.

i29 This deposit will be published by C. E Macdonald and E. Hatzaki in due course.

i30 Where Roux and Courty (n. 16), 48, have argued that 'wheel throwing appears more like an evolution of concept, developed through a stage of wheel shaping'.

'31 Van der Leeuw (n. 102). i'32 As highlighted by Roux and Corbetta (n. 2).

'33 It would not require a specialist to bring the wheel device from the Near East, but it would to bring the technical knowledge. One might also note that the adoption of the wheel-throwing technique would occur more smoothly if the technical knowledge held by Minoan artisans was predisposed towards it. Coil-building and rotation finishing is a common technique in the later Prepalatial period, and this would certainly have been consistent with the logic of wheel-throwing, cf. van der Leeuw (n. I02), 262.

I26 CARL KNAPPETT

the Near East. We may speculate that some select potters, under the wing of the palatial authority, had their throwing expertise accelerated through exposure to Near Eastern specialists.'34 The very fact that the wheel has been shown to develop gradually out of a turntable tradition in other contexts means that, even though here we argue the innovation came to Crete from elsewhere, the technique would not have been impossible for Minoan potters at the cognitive level. Their existing tradition would have made them quick learners.

Ethnographic data collected by Helms'35 suggest that such a process is indeed credible- contact with the Near East engineered by the elites may well have involved the diplomatic exchange of skilled artisans. The crafting activities performed by skilled artisans are distinct from the everyday production of domestic objects. It is not a matter of private, domestic activity, but of public crafting, associated with public, political figures. There may have been good reason for these dlite political figures to nurture the links between the skilled artisans under their authority, and their counterparts in the Near East. This is certainly one way in which the learning necessary to work the wheel could have been accelerated: through exposure to Near Eastern specialists, within a framework of 6lite power relations.

Moreover, the features of the first wheel-thrown vessels (as observed above) are highly reminiscent of metal originals. These include various types of vessels which appear to be pottery imitations of metal shapes (carinated cups, kantharoi, and other tablewares with 'metallicizing' features such as thin walls, strap handles, and thick lustrous slips), which may have had their origins in the Near East.'36 Thus there are two features-wheel-throwing as a technique, and the vessels it was first used to produce--that can be placed within a broader context of elite contacts with the Near East. The production and consumption of such vessels, both metal and ceramic, may represent an effort on the part of the Minoan elites to tie themselves into wider prestige systems beyond Crete.'37

We may not ever know if the technical knowledge and skill was brought by Minoan artisans returning from the Near East after a lengthy absence,'38 or Near Eastern artisans coming to Crete. Both these scenarios are inherently possible, finding further support in Helms, who notes in ethnographic contexts the particular association of artisans with travel in 'outside' realms.'39 She also maintains that artisans from such realms may be especially highly valued.

'34 In terms of links to the Near East, Watrous (n. 3) has

argued that a cultural 'package' is taken on board by the Minoans; this package would include the institution of

kingship, along with kingly regalia, administrative practices using scripts, monumental architecture and other crafts. Wheel-thrown pottery and the skilled artisans producing it

may have formed part of the package. '35 M. Helms, Craft and the Kingly Ideal (Austin, Tex., 1993). 136 It is unclear if we should look specifically to the

Levant, to Egypt or to Anatolia. A wheel-thrown carinated

cup looking quite similar to MM I-II examples from East Crete has been found at Ialysos on Rhodes, cf. M. Benzi, 'Evidence for a Middle Minoan settlement on the acropolis at Ialysos (Mt. Philerimos)', in Haigg and Marinatos (n. 8), 93-105. Benzi also notes that similar carinated cups have been found at Serraglio on Kos, and at Tigani on Samos. These finds begin to suggest an Anatolian connection for carinated cups and, by extension, the wheel-throwing technique. For the idea that silver kantharoi (such as the one

from Gournia) are of Anatolian derivation, see E. N. Davis, The Vapheio Cups and Aegean Gold and Silver Ware (London, 1977).

'37 S. W. Manning, Before Daidalos: The Origins of Complex Society, and the Genesis of the State on Crete (Ph.D. thesis, Cambridge, 1995).

'~8 For 'Egyptianizing' features at Mallia cf. J.-C. Poursat, 'Une thalassocratie minoenne au Minoen Moyen II?', in

Hagg and Marinatos (n. 8), 86-7; in general comments (ibid. 113), Poursat notes that Kamares Ware has been found in

Egyptian workers' houses at Kahun, which may mean that Minoan artisans had worked there for a considerable period of time. The possibility of direct interaction between Egyptian and Minoan craftsmen is also mentioned by S. A. Immerwahr, 'The possible influence of Egyptian art in the

creation of Minoan wall painting', in P. Darcque and J.-C. Poursat (eds), L'icongraphie minoenne (BCH supp. II; Athens,

I985), 41-50.

'39 Helms (n. 135).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 127

In this respect an additional point of significance is that such travelling often occurs at the behest of an elite patron; an artisan may be sent from one royal court to another, or may be requested by an elite group. This correlates perfectly well with Bargatzky's idea that innovative artisans must co-operate with the 'leaders of opinion' in the indigenous society, be they regal, religious, or mercantile.140 In that the activities of the innovative skilled artisan may have been initiated and masterminded by the elites themselves, these Hlites may themselves be regarded as innovators, although presumably incompetent in the wheel-throwing technique.

Could the actual potting technique responsible for the creation of these %lite wares have also played a symbolic and cultural role in the construction of dlite status? Mahias, in an anthropological study of potters in India, indicates that technological choices, such as the use of the wheel, can play a significant part in the negotiation of social status.'4' The symbolic role of production processes is further accentuated by Helms,'42 who states that craft tools can be mystically charged. If in Minoan society a particular mystical significance was attached to the Near East, and if in MM I B the wheel technique and device were strongly associated with this outside realm, then the wheel may have possessed very strong symbolic associations.'43 If access to this outside realm was controlled by the elites, the adoption of wheel technology from the Near East would not have been just a reflection of increasing palatial influence, but would have constituted an active element in the very creation and subsequent consolidation of that authority.

SUBSEQUENT PHASES OF INNOVATION

Spratt states that every process, innovative or traditional, needs to be described not only in terms of what impels the process to take place, but also with respect to what course the process took, how long the various phases lasted and why, and what factors led to the ultimate outcome.'44 We have argued that the motivation for the introduction of the wheel lay in the hands of the elites (perhaps in their pursuit of an ideological basis for their authority), rather than the artisans. Yet we must now turn to Spratt's second stage of description, the various phases in the process of innovation and adoption. He distinguishes a number of possible phases: discovery, invention, development, investment, production and distribution, and obsolescence. The first three phases are barely relevant since we are dealing with a borrowed technology, and neither is the final phase, as in the periods under examination the technique does not become obsolete. This leaves only the middle categories of his scheme, which render it limited in its usefulness.

I prefer to take on board the insights proffered in the work of Layton, and his use of concepts put forward by Cancian pertaining to the status of those who first accept innovations.'45 Of significance for present purposes is Cancian's distinction, highlighted by Layton, between two phases of innovation: an initial one in which a lack of knowledge about

'40 T. Bargatzky, 'Innovation and the integration of sociocultural systems', in van der Leeuw and Torrence (n. 5), I6-32.

'4' Mahias (n. 5). 142 Helms (n. r35). '43 Evans (n. 33), ii, xI6, himself points out some mystical

associations. He calls attention to the tradition that Talos invented the wheel, and that an alternative Greek name for

Talos is Perdix, the swift moving demon of Minos. '44 D. A. Spratt, 'Innovation theory made plain', in van der

Leeuw and Torrence (n. 5), 245-57. '45 R. Layton, 'Pellaport', in van der Leeuw and Torrence

(n. 5), 33-53; E Cancian, 'Stratification and risk-taking: a theory tested on agricultural innovation', American Sociological Review, 32 (I967), 912-27.

128 CARL KNAPPETT

probable outcomes creates uncertainty, followed by a period of wider understanding and consequently reduced risk in application. This perception of risk and associated uncertainty will have an 'inhibiting effect' upon the adoption of an innovation. Of greater import is Cancian's notion that different members of a group, according to their social standing, may have quite different perceptions of the risk involved. Those of higher status are likely to have greater access to information, thereby reducing the feeling of uncertainty and risk in the initial phase. Although those of middling status may be more cautious and hesitant in the initial phase, Cancian argues that it will be this group that will be the most enthusiastic adopters of a new technology in the subsequent stage of lower risk. Those of lowest status may not even have the necessary financial means, even in the low risk stage, to go ahead with the innovation. They are deprived of the minimum 'facilitating effect' of wealth.

How does this general proposal fit with the Minoan evidence? It seems that the MM I B period could correspond to the initial phase of uncertainty, as described by Layton and Cancian. Only certain artisans, presumably those most closely linked to the emerging elites, and hence those with greatest access to information and wealth, were uninhibited by risk and were able to adopt the wheel-throwing technique. Those craftsmen with more humble associations perceived the risk to themselves to be greater, thereby experiencing an inhibiting effect upon innovation. The adoption of the wheel-throwing method is indeed a risky venture; it is a technique requiring a long apprenticeship to master. Only in MM II A is the subsequent phase of lower risk observed, and as a result a more widespread use of the wheel for nearly all small vessels.

But in this same period, many medium-sized vessels such as jugs and jars are still coil-built, with only certain fine ware types (e.g. polychrome bridge-spouted jars) being wheel-thrown. What inhibiting effects prevented the wheel-throwing of medium-sized vessels, at least until MM II B? The process would not require any additional capital investment, although it would demand greater skill and control in drawing up a body of clay, quite possibly on a relatively unstable device.

As for medium-large vessels, not even the more precocious potters learn how to wheel- throw such tall vessels as oval-mouthed amphorae during the Old Palace Period; it is only in the MM III B-LM I A period that these sizes are actually thrown (in fact, 'coiled and thrown'). Van der Leeuw has stated that a number of constraints would have to be removed one by one before the use of rapid rotation could be applied to larger vessels, such as a larger wheel (more momentum), better ways to fix the wheel (less friction), or using finer clays.'46 It would also be a question of the market--it would seem that demand did not warrant the potter taking time to develop the much more difficult technique of throwing larger vessels until the Neopalatial period. What were the barriers to more rapid progress with medium and medium-large vessels? One could argue that although the initial innovation was influenced primarily by political and cultural considerations, the subsequent slow application of the wheel technique to larger vessels was affected by technical and economic factors.

So although the introduction of the wheel appears as a relatively sudden technological innovation in MM I B, the application of this technique to vessels of increasing size is of a more gradual nature, spanning perhaps 300 years, and passing through a number of intermediate stages. In this regard the argument of Roux and Courty, and of van der Leeuw,

146 Van der Leeuw (n. 98).

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY 129

that the technique of throwing develops gradually through intermediate stages,'47 does have relevance.

CONCLUSIONS

In explaining the wheel-throwing innovation, economic considerations have in other contexts proven to be of great significance. The wheel would surely allow a potter to produce many more vessels per unit of time, thereby increasing efficiency and profits. Yet when we observe this Minoan case, questions of economic efficiency do not appear to be predominant. It has been argued here that the wheel technique, and the vessels it was first used to produce, can be placed within the context of the political manipulation by Minoan elites of their special contacts with the symbolically charged world of the Near East. The production and consumption of such vessels, both metal and ceramic, may have represented an effort on the part of these dlites to validate their local authority, by tying themselves into wider cultural systems beyond Crete.'48

We may also note that only some artisans at Knossos during the Middle Minoan I B period possessed the skill, the capital, or the need to use the wheel. Might we be talking here of a monopoly held by the elites not only over long-distance contacts, but also over wheel technology, capital, and their own attached artisans? Only through time would other artisans, not supported by the elites, be able to achieve the necessary understanding of the technology to use it to their own ends, overcoming their own perceptions of the risks involved in implementing this new technique. In the periods following MM I B the wheel technique is used for more and more vessels, as various social and technical difficulties are gradually overcome. It is only some 300oo years later that Minoan potters see fit to throw a wide range of vessel shapes and sizes on the wheel.

I hope to have demonstrated how it is possible to study innovation as a process influenced not only by technical, but also by social factors. What is particularly interesting with the Knossos evidence is the double dynamic, the ways in which the strengths of the technical and the social oscillate through time-socially driven in the first instance, with technical factors more significant thereafter. The Knossos material constitutes a unique case study allowing for the evaluation of the dynamics of technological change over the long term. As this long-term perspective is a phenomenon unique to archaeology, it is clear that archaeologists can and should contribute to the wider debates in anthropology and socio-technical studies concerning the nature of technological change.

Christ's College, Cambridge CARL KNAPPETT

47 Roux and Courty (n. 16); van der Leeuw (n. 98). '48 Manning (n. '37).

PLATE 16

(a)

(b)

(c)

KNAPPETT TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY

(a) Interior of wide-based, baggy-shaped jar. Royal Road South, late MM I A. (b) Small carinated bridge-spouted jar. Royal Road South, late MM I A (c) Interior view of small jar shown in PLATE I6 b.

PLATE 17

(a)

(b)

(c)

KNAPPETT TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY

(a) Interior of monochrome straight-sided cup. Early West Magazines, MM I B. (b) Interior of crude straight-sided cup. Early West Magazines, MM I B (c) Crude footed goblet (inverted). Early West Magazines, MM I B.

PLATE 18

(a)

(b)

(c)

KNAPPETT TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY

(a) Crude miniature goblet. Early West Magazines, MM I B. (b) Miniature handleless cup (inverted)--as above. (c) Interior of same vessel shown in PLATE I8 b.

PLATE 19

(a)

(b)

(c)

KNAPPETT TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY

(a) Interior of beaked jug. Royal Road South, MM I B. (b) Interior of bridge-spouted jar. Royal Road South, MM I B. (c) Interior neck of beaked jug. From SVII 8, MM II A.

PLATE 20

(a) (b)

(c) (d) KNAPPETT

TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY (a) Beaked jug. From SVII 8, MM II A. (b) Interior shoulder of beaked jug shown in PLATE 20 a. (c) Exterior base of straight-sided

cup, with marks from 'shaving' on the wheel. Royal Road South, MM II A. (d) Exterior base of carinated cup, showing paring marks. Royal Road South, MM II A.

tl

(a)

(b)

(c)

1M KNAPPETT

TRADITION

AND

INNOVATION

IN POTTERY

FORMING

TECHNOLOGY

(a) Wheel-thrown

beaked

jug.

From

SVII

8, MM

II A. (b) Base

of beaked

jug

in PLATE

21 a, showing

concentric

striations.

(c) Wheel-thrown

bridge-spouted

jar.

From

SVII

8, MM

II A. (d)

Base

of jar

with

concentric

striations.

Royal

Road

South,

MM

II A.

PLATE 22

(a) (b)

(c) (d)

KNAPPETT TRADITION AND INNOVATION IN POTTERY FORMING TECHNOLOGY

(a) Lower body of wheel-thrown jar with sagging. Royal Road South, MM II A. (b) Interior of coil-built piriform jar (incised Linear A signs to exterior). From Acropolis Hill (KS 178), MM III B-LM I A. (c) Wheel-thrown medium-large jar. From

Acropolis Hill (KS I78), MM III B-LM I A. (d) Coil seams at interior upper body of large jar. Royal Road South, MM II A.

Hd

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d) KNAPPETT

TRADITION

AND

INNOVATION

IN POTTERY

FORMING

TECHNOLOGY

(a) Coil

seams

at interior

lower

body

of cooking

pot.

From

SVII

8, MM

II A. (b) Interior

of wheel-thrown

medium

jar.

Royal

Road

South,

MM

II A. (c) Paring

at lower

body

of medium

jar

shown

in PLATE

23 b. (d) Interior

of coil-built

medium-large

jar,

vertical

finger

marks

from

smoothing

of coils.

Royal

Road

South,

MM

II A.