Some Comments on Interpreting the Dark-Surfaced Handmade Burnished Pottery of the 13th and 12th Century BCE Aegean

Abstract

David Small's attempt (JMA this issue) to explain the appearance, at major centers in the late Minoan-Mycenaean world, of dark-surfaced, handmade, and burnished vessels as a response to economic stress by native Aegean smallholders is reviewed. With the possible exception of the terminal Mycenaean material from Kalapodi in Phocis, Small's hypothesis fails to explain the ceramic data presently known: the novel pottery in question is distinguished not merely by its technology but also by a typology of shape and decoration which Small has ignored because he mistakenly considers it more or less universal in the context of a household mode of production. A brief review of such issues as this handmade pottery's distribution, frequency, impact on native Aegean wheelmade wares, and function(s) within the Minoan-Mycenaean world leads to the conclusion that past evaluations of the origins and significance of this material have probably been unduly oversimplified. Future progress on addressing these and related questions is dependent on fuller publication of this fundamentally non-Aegean pottery in the Minoan and Aegean contexts in which it has been found.