Page 137 - Index Pottery of Dvaravati Period - Professor Emerita Dr.Phasook Indrawooth

Summary

The pottery found in most archaeological sites that were occupied by man,
has changed very little in its appearance since it was fired and used. Although most

excavated vessels are broken or exist only in the form of potsherds, they serve
as important evidence of the people who made and used them. Pottery preserves in

its shape, decoration and physical properties a permanent record of some of man

activities.
The common concept usually held by archaeologists is that a people's

standards and traditions have a strong influence to maintain a certain degree
of uniformity and thus produce recognizable styles. If changes in technique and style

are gradual and consistent, they will reflect the passage of time and a relative ceramic

sequence can be defined. It is assumed that a rate of change is greater in style than
in technique, and that a continuity of style is often interpreted as one evidence

of continuity of population and sudden change in style as indicative of shift

in population. And typological similarities are analyzed in terms of the relationship
of cultures and their influence on one another. When intrusive pottery can be

identified, it is used to establish the contemporaneity of occupations and to trace

trade relation.
Besides typological study, it is necessary to determine the mineralogical,

physical and chemical properties of pottery in order to gain information about
the rawmaterials selected and used by the potter, their treatment before being formed

into pots. Formerly it was held that chemical analysis (breaking substance down

into the elements of which it is composed and determining their proportions) provide
useful information for archaeologists. But at present it is generally accepted that certain

methods of the physical sciences have become very important in analysis. In facts it is
the way in which elements are combined that tells what archaeologists want to know.

The regular patterns of arrangement of atoms in all crystalline substances afford

a powerful means of investigation and identification. There are various techniques
for studying the proporties which result from atomic arrangement, the most important

of which is the technique of optical crystallography. However the actual pattern

of atomic arrangement can be studied by X-ray diffraction. These methods of the

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