Chat with a dig supervisor in Turkey changed how I date pottery

I was on a Roman site near Ephesus last summer and the lead archaeologist showed me how he could spot a 2nd century shard just by the rim angle. He said he spent 10 years looking at broken pots before it clicked. Has anyone else had a mentor who made a tricky part of field work suddenly make sense?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_emery25d ago

Respectfully, that rim angle thing sounds like a shortcut that can lead you wrong. A lot of local clay sources change the way rims break and sit, so what works in one region might not hold up 50 miles away. Better to learn the whole context of a site before trusting one trick too much.

rayc8924d ago

That rim angle trick bit me on a site near Tulsa once, you're right.