General Information

Gritty cooking ware is a thin-walled, hard, brittle fabric with a gritty texture akin to fine-grained sandpaper on the surface and in section, where a few small white inclusions are visible (Berlin 1997b:12). Exterior surfaces that are not burnt are often fired reddish yellow (5YR 6/8). Vessels are, in general, fully fired, but can have a narrow gray core. Petrographic analysis shows that such vessels have a ferruginous clay matrix with an admixture of silt as well as poorly sorted quartz sand. The sand temper is identical to that of other vessels analyzed from and found in quantity in ‘Akko, which is the ware’s likely origin. As the name implies, gritty cooking ware was used to produce cooking vessels, specifically small globular cooking pots and casseroles.

Hard and brittle, thin walled cooking fabric with occasional small to medium angular white inclusions. Gritty cooking ware is normally fired dark gray (7.5YR 4/1) and often has a sharp black core (5YR 3/1). The ware has a bumpy surface texture and often a partially vitrified orange to dark gray self slip on the surface (2.5YR 4/6-7.5YR 4/1).

'Akko, Harbor (Israel/Northern Coastal Plain)

Kokhim Cave (Israel/Galilee)

Qedesh/Kedesh (Israel/Galilee)