CRAFTER: Potting Techniques of the Bronze Age

Throughout its history, experimental archaeology has fulfilled a valuable role in archaeological research, allowing craftspeople and scholars alike to deepen an understanding of people and their societies in the past. EXARC’s recent involvement in the CRAFTER project, and the author’s participation in its International Meeting in Mula (Spain), has demonstrated that significant knowledge gaps remain in our understanding of potting practices in Europe during the Bronze Age. The following discussion provides an overview of some of the benefits of focusing research on defining those practices more clearly and consistently, while raising a few issues which have historically complicated matters. A very brief summary is then provided of some recent contributions which explicitly describe pottery forming practices at sites across Europe, presented following the very broad tripartite system of Early, Middle, and Late Bronze Age. Finally, some lingering questions are posed, in order to examine how we as experimental archaeologists and craftspeople may work more collaboratively in order to create a fuller and richer picture of the European Bronze Age potter’s life.