Pottery Summary

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Ceramic finds retained from T21 in 1975 occupy one and a half boxes, and are divided as follows: heavy coarse ware; light coarse ware and impasto; orange ware; grey ware; bucchero and buccheroid; and fine buff and painted wares; unusual or interesting pieces never entered separately in the book; and pieces entered but never catalogued.  Catalogued pottery including pieces with full profile preserved, are stored separately.

Of the enormous quantity of pottery T21 yielded in 1979 the vast majority is impasto or coarseware, often heavy coarse ware.  The orangish, heavy coarseware vessels appear to be large, ovoid jars with thick, molded and slightly everted lips; with some globular pots having their plain mouths decorated outside with rough, raised horizontal bands; and in general, lug handles, which abound.  Lighter coarseware and impasto vessels tend to be smaller versions of the above, with their flat bases and molded everted lips.  Some globular pots have simple lips slightly offset to form a collar as well, and many plain lips are decorated with a row of horizontal ridges or wavy fasciae (see the catalogued jars p. 169 #5, p. 267 #8).  Shallow, footed cups or bowls and burnished impasto chalices also occur.  Handles may be lugs or doubled straps.  Orange and grey wares are distinguished by the characteristic evenness and purity of the color in question but above all by their relatively well-levigated fabric and thin walls.  Large and small footed bowls are characteristic of both.  Grey ware rims tend to curn evenly in form the body, orange ware rims to form molded everted lips.  Grey and orange also share a typiclaly chalky, friable surface, however a more compact and curnished orange ware exists for large chalices and tiny, apparently "Ionic" (in form) bowls.  Bucchero and buccheroid are fairly plentiful and include some sottile fragments.  Large and moderate sized kantharoi and small cups of "Ionic" shape are typical and pieces of all levels of quality may bear decoration of a pain of parallel grooves or troughs, as well as an occasional stamped or impressed decoration.  The fine buff caragory is extremely heretogenous with greyish, brownish, pinkish and nearly white fabrics.  These are probably imported and often painted with solid black glaze or black or red stripes.  Two pieces bear figural black-figured painting and probably belong to the same Lakonian cup.  "Ionic bowls" and larger oenochoae occur.

Most pottery is in non-joining sherds.  Full profiles are rare, but a few

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largely complete pots were excavated in burn soil in grids N-O 33.  Fragments of unusual interst include: a thick lug pierced vertically with two holes; two fragments of open work vessels in an unusual buff fabric; a fragment of a coarseware stand of some sort; a fragment of an enormous shallow tub, now catalogued; and two crucible fragments.

Note also the unusual frequency and variety of lids, including bucchero, orangeware and fineware fragments and belong to large and small, decorated and undecorated lids.

Incised characters are found on bucchero, impasto, orangeware and greyware fragments and include three possible alphas and a possible nu.

Incised and impressed decoration is rare but varied.  A tiny orangeware fragment has a daisy-like rosette in relief.  A greyware rim featured a burnished latticework pattern (pp. 231 #4), bucchero sherds appear with incised zigzag and arcade patterns (pp. 341 #1, 287 #1).  Circular stamped motifs include asterisk rosettes, trefoil scrolls, quatrefoil scrolls and other rectilinear and curvilinear designs (pp. 229 #1, 333 #6, 287 #3, 317 #1, 331 #2, 303 #1).  Cylinder stamp and other rolled designs include a row of winged beasts, an abstract design bordered by interlocking scrolls, rows of dashes and hatched triangles, and rope-like lines (pp 287 #2, 337 #6, 281 #1, 333 #8, 331 #1).  Rows of elongated rosettes are impressed in an orangeware sherd, p. 333 #5; and a motive consisting of a triangle and an arc over its apex is impressed in a bucchero fragment.

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