General Information

Globular cooking pots, crudely made by hand, sometimes with additional clay added around the upper to mid body, variously finished by nicking to look like rope, thumbprints or pie crust-like. In the Ottoman period, pinprick decoration on handles and around the rim is known at Qula and al-Qubab (Avissar 2009). The body is deep, the mouth wide, and the handles variously shaped. The form and dimensions vary over time, and the details can be chronologically diagnostic. Other features that can be diagnostic of specific productions are wall thickness and the overall shape. For example, one group from Petra is characterized by lime temper added to the clay and to the chaff temper; their walls are thinner, their shape is more regular, and in general it seems that their manufacture is of a higher quality. This higher quality group is middle Islamic in date. On the other hand, another group of these cooking pots found at Faynan also have thin walls and regular shape, but have crushed quartz temper. A group of a much lower manufacturing quality which is extremely common in Petra through the whole middle to late Islamic period is the one with a raised band applied around the widest part of the body and no added lime temper. Overall there are many variations in fabric, shape, and fineness - including in the same sites, periods, and even contexts, suggesting many different producers.

Most readily identified by the handmade production technique, unslipped or slipped surface (often red: see for example (Stern 2017, page 3, Fig. 2: 2, 4), and shape: globular body, wide mouth and everted rim. Walls are generally thick, ranging from 5mm, which are among the thinnest walled, up to 3-4 cm. Often have sooty black coating on the bottom and exterior walls, up to the handle.The bottoms are generally not preserved, but both rounded and flat bottoms are known.

Handmade Cooking Pots (Avissar and Stern 2005, pp. 94-96)

Stern 2017( Pottery from Khirbat Yamna)

Afula (Israel/Jezreel Valley)

Beth She'an, Scythopolis (Israel/Beth She'an Valley)

Horbat Bet Zeneta (Israel/Galilee)

Kfar Kanna, Jebel Khuweikha (Israel/Galilee)

Khirbet Din'ila (Israel/Galilee)

Mt. Carmel, St. Mary (Israel/Carmel Mountains)

Tel Gush Halav (Israel/Galilee)

Jerusalem, Old City/East Jerusalem (Israel-Palestinian Authority/Central Highlands)

Khirbat Nuqayb al-Asaymir (Jordan/Wadi 'Arabah)

Petra (Jordan/Southern Sandstone Highlands)

al-Wu'ayra (Jordan/Southern Sandstone Highlands)