Azərbaycan Respublikası Təhsil Nazirliyi West Caspian University

Introduction

The Bronze Age has been examined from many perspectives through the history of archaeological inquiry, and one can track the theoretical and methodological frameworks of the field through time simply by evaluating the way that ceramics have been discussed. At present, there are a plethora of high-quality contributions every year which further refine our understanding of ceramics and – by extension – the social lives and cultural practices from this period of human history. The present contribution serves as a very brief overview of the state of our knowledge of pottery forming techniques in use during the Bronze Age across Europe in order to highlight gaps which experimental archaeology is well-suited to tackle.

In discussing the European Bronze Age, an expansive perspective is taken here, encompassing those regions which border the European Atlantic coast, the North Sea, Baltic Sea, Black Sea, the northern Mediterranean, northern/western Anatolia, and central Europe as well. The groups which developed, dominated, and declined over the Bronze Age illustrate the networks of trade and interaction across the continent. This amply justifies a broad perspective in considering potential scope of knowledge transmission between potters and communities, irrespective of whether production was domestic or workshop-based, specialised or not. Phenomena such as itinerancy, artisan exchange, intermarriage, warfare, enslavement, and resettlement are all potential mechanisms of technological transfer at the micro-regional level. These small-scale interactions, when considered over the whole of the Bronze Age, can tell a powerful story of population interaction. Indeed, the spread of bronze metallurgy has been interpreted in this very manner, highlighting networks of interaction which most likely predated the innovation itself.