General Information

The Light Brown Ware ("Hellbraune Ware") and its finer specimen, the Fine Light Brown Ware ("Feine Hellbraune Ware"), are the typical wares for common pottery of everyday-use in the Milesian region, including Didyma, the extra-urban sanctuary of Miletos in the Archaic period. The definition of this ware is based on the macroscopic classification of archaic material coming from excavations on Taxiarchis hill at Didyma. It more or less corresponds to a ware group that was first defined for Didymean material by Schattner 2007, 46, 47, and petrographically described by Riederer 2007, 55. A local production on the site of Didyma is not yet attested.

The ware encompasses the whole range of functional groups (vessels for drinking, mixing, serving, pouring, transporting, storing, food preparing), and of well-known South Ionian shapes (skyphoi, cups, mugs, kraters, lebetes, bowls, plates, jugs and juglets, amphorae, hydriae, stamnoi). Some further shapes of (Fine) Light Brown Ware that might prove to be especially distinctive for the micro-regional pottery production of the 6th century and/or the functional sanctuary background at Didyma are the band bowls and a large variety of small closed vessels (hydriskoi, small table amphorae, aryballoi, amphoriskoi).

The ware usually contains a lot of mica and a few other inclusions that become visible mostly under the binocular. Surfaces are generally smooth, but seldom slipped with a wash, and never polished. Colour, according to the Munsell Soil Colour Charts, ranges from reddish yellow/yellowish red (5YR 5/6 – 5YR 6/6) to pink (7.5YR 8/4) in the core, and pink on the surface (7.5YR 7/4 - 7.5YR 7/6). Vessels usually are decorated with horizontal banding and/or wavy lines; shapes of the 7th century can be solidly glazed. The (Fine) Light Brown Ware was produced in the 7th and 6th centuries BC, probably extending into the 5th century BC. As far as fabric typology, surface treatment and selection of shapes are concerned, the (Fine) Light Brown Ware is closely consistent with South Ionian/Milesian Fine Wares (Orientalising pottery, Fikellura). A local production on the site of Didyma is not yet attested.

Didyma, Taxiarchis Hill (Turkey/Aegean)