Practical problems in the application of the chaîne opératoire theory

Practical problems regarding the application of the chaîne opératoire theory in the study of archaeological ceramics

In practice, applying chaîne opératoire theory to archaeological artefacts is challenged by several obstacles. A major problem in ceramic studies is that most approaches to chaîne opératoire rely heavily on ethnographic research on contemporary pottery production (e.g. Peacock, 1982). Orton et al. (1993, 17) also argue that the large amounts of contemporary written evidence for pottery production in historical periods have greatly contributed to our knowledge of organisation and modes of production, although these approaches are not usually regarded as ethnographic evidence.

Ethnographic research is not necessarily problematic, and to date, it has played an important role in understanding the combinations of economic, technological, ideological, and social parameters involved in the ceramic production sequence. Ethnographers and ethnoarchaeologists are privileged to record technological choices, knowledge and skill inside the production context “as the process unfolds” (David & Kramer 2001, 141). At the same time, they observe the social notions and messages transmitted through artefacts in a chronologically contemporary consumption context (e.g., Barley 1994). The difficulty begins when pottery is discovered in an archaeological context, where the potter and the broader society are unfortunately absent.

The first issue in the study of contemporary ceramic chaînes opératoires is that production is viewed either as industrial (mass production) or ‘traditional’ (e.g. Peacock 1982; Rye 1981). Ethnographic studies tend to focus on modes of production that still use materials and techniques that have not been completely altered by modern technological development. It remains questionable how well these ethnographic approaches to contemporary modes of production fit the operational sequence models of past societies. And if this is the case, then in which contexts? According to Van der Leeuw (1991, 13), if archaeologists are to realise their avowed aim of reconstructing the process of how people made decisions in the past, they will have to stop looking back from their present position in time, trying to recognise which patterns of the past are still used in the present. By contrast, they will have to travel back in time and look forward with those people whom they study at the moment (Van der Leeuw 1991, 13).

A second issue to consider is that, in contemporary society, the production and consumption contexts are the same. However, this correlation may not hold for past societies. Archaeologists are aware that artefacts have several connected afterlives; they tend to travel through time, while they are likely to be used each time differently in each afterlife (Gosden & Marshall 1999). In ethnographic research, the idea of a pot’s afterlife is completely absent. Artefact reuse or discard is expected to occur in the future; therefore, it will be explored by someone else. For archaeologists, however, reuse and discard are two important sources of information that must be taken into account.

A third issue to consider is how one can find a secure way to exchange data between a modern and an ancient ceramic chaîne opératoire. What may be happening similarly or differently between those two contexts? The popularity of the chaîne opératoire theory in the study of prehistoric lithic artefacts can be traced across a variety of studies produced over the years by Japanese, French, and American theoretical schools (Bleed 2001). Yet the same variety of approaches does not seem to exist in the study of ceramic artefacts, especially those from historical times. Additionally, the practical study of pottery production in historical periods requires the creation of typologies by classifying and categorising ceramic material. The term is generally described as a form of taxonomy, and, according to David & Kramer (2001, 157-62), it can be either etic or emic. In the first case, researchers employ devised typologies to resolve specific problems related to artefacts, such as temporal relationships, cultural affiliation, community styles, trade and technology (Hayden 1984, 82). In the second case, researchers accept folk classifications that are widely encountered in ethnography, used by common people, subject to change over time, and orally and informally transmitted from one generation to another (Kempton 1981, 3). A main problem in investigating chaîne opératoire models in ancient pottery production is that, even though ethnology follows folk classifications in an emic approach, classical archaeology follows devised typologies that fall between emic and etic. For example, John Beazley (1927-8) notes that the shape nowadays described as an aryballos in antiquity might also have been called a lekythion. In that sense, it is not entirely certain if the pseudo-emic typologies followed by Classical archaeologists are the exact emic typologies of the past.

Any approach to ancient ceramic chaînes opératoires could incorporate information from ethnographic research, though some caution is warranted. Researchers need to bear in mind that pseudo-emic typologies are the only available ones since the 19th century, especially in Greek Early Iron Age studies; therefore, approaches should incorporate these rather than ethnographic folk classifications. The final products of ceramic workshops need to be viewed as the result of successive technological choices subject to a series of social choices, also controlled by the potter’s behaviour.

Notes

1. For ethnographic work on Greek ceramic workshops see: Casson (1938; 1951); Rieth (1960); Hampe (1962); Hampe & Winter (1962; 1965); Voyatzoglou (1984); Cuomo di Caprio (1982; 1985; 1991; 1995); Blitzer (1984; 1990); Jones (1986, 849-880); London (1989); London et al. (1989); Schneiber (1999).