An optically passive calcareous clay matrix, light brown to light grayish brown when transmitting light. The matrix contains equal quantities of silt-sized to fine sand-sized (ca. 0.6–0.7 mm) quartz and carbonate material. Silt-sized quartz is dominantly angular, characterizing the region’s aeolian dust, and the sand-sized quartz grains are 0.05–0.8 mm rounded to sub-angular mature quartz, sometimes with ferruginous coating. The carbonate material is rounded to sub-angular fragments of chalk or limestone, milky, sometimes with dispersed edges, apparently a result of firing, the largest grains of which measure ca. 0.7 mm. Ore mineral is represented by minute specks and rounded to angular sand-sized fragments. Altogether, the non-plastic inclusions make up ca. 30–40% of the sherds’ volume. According to the optical passivity of the matrix and the calcareous inclusions, the firing temperature was estimated at ca. 750–800 °C. The lithology is most likely derived from quarzitic sand-stones—corresponds to the Lower Cretaceous Kurnub Group sandstones and siltstones. The potential provenience can be detected based on archaeometric and historical considerations, helping to narrow down all the possibilities mentioned before. Ceramics with buff-colored fabric, both plain and glazed, are well known from both Early Islamic and Early Crusader traditional production, common in archaeological contexts all over the southern Levant. The previous archaeometric investigations, which included the chemical and petro-graphic analysis of the light-color alkaline glazed wares from production and consumption sites such as Beirut, Tiberias, Acre, El-Kabri, Horbat ʿUza, and Apollonia (Stern,
Waksman, and Shapiro 2020: 117–21), revealed that the calcareous raw materials resulting in buff colors in the final product had been professionally chosen by the potters among the clays available in the workshop’s vicinity. The significant available comparanda enables determining that the currently discussed bowls from Le Lyon midden were manufactured in Beirut.