Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Thanet Arch Acacia motif? (footnote)

At the hip of this Thanet, England beaker and you'll notice what appears to be an Acacia Leaf motif.

At first appearance, it might be taken as cordage, or pho-cordage, but it doesn't look like a typical corded braid.

"Woman's Burial" (1cm inc) Thanet Arch


I've speculated [before] that Iberian acacia-leaf pottery might be appropriately named and that its derivatives (in keeping with Andrew Sherratt) were taken as a psychoactive, either in tea form or as an additive to alcohol.

I assumed that only a stylized version would have left Iberia, but it appears in this beaker and in other EBA pottery, usually a well depicted, single band is maintained in numerous potteries that went afar.

*Update 1*

The good people of Thanet Arch provided some closeups of the beaker comb impressions and the waist decoration.  See [here]   (I just realized that the hyperlinks have been ghosting instead of turning blue.  They're now blue, see above.)
 
In a previous post, linked above, I wondered if the herringbone is in fact, stylized acacia.  I think you see this trend with proto-writing as the natural became stylized, divorced from its original expression.
The naturalness of this beaker's waist caught my attention.

The closeups are great.  Hat tip Thanetarch.

*Update 2*

IOT avoid confusion the title was updated to say "motif?".  Hopefully what I am trying to express is coming out clearly.  It is a single motif embedded within a larger expression that I find interesting.

3 comments:

  1. "Hopefully what I am trying to express is coming out clearly"

    If it's legacy of / echo of, then yes.

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  2. Lots of Bell Beaker and Iberian ancient DNA abstracts in the PDF linked to here...

    http://www.burgos2014uispp.com/modules.php?name=webstructure&lang=EN&idwebstructure=108

    I'm assuming the papers are on the way. Hopefully we'll see the one listed on page 980 ASAP, but with more than just mtDNA data.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks! I saw the abstract book when it came out but totally missed the part on the DNA somehow. I look forward to it.

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