The physical and mineralogical characteristics of pottery from Mochong, Rota, Mariana Islands

Abstract

In a reflective paper about the relationship between archaeometry and archaeology, Atholl observed that ‘whereas most archaeological data arise from direct observation or the use of simple equipment, archaeometrical data are characteristically created by complex machinery, the use of which is sometimes taken as a rule-of-thumb guide to the limits of the subject’ (Anderson 1987:3). He identified a gulf between the two disciplines which is only briefly bridged when archaeologists themselves colonise one attractive new methodological patch created by archaeometrists before moving on to the next (ibid:13). We hope that Atholl will appreciate our attempt here to occupy a new patch using bucket chemistry and only simple equipment with no flashing lights and fancy dials, in an effort to learn a little more from tiny scraps of apparently insignificant pot sherds.