A ceramic fingerprinting database

TECHNOLOGY WATCH: Israeli archaeologists launch project to trace origins of ancient pottery. The project, launched by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), aims to trace the origin of thousands of ceramic vessels even when the kilns where they were fired have long vanished (PESACH BENSON/TPS via Jerusalem Post).

According to a recent IAA announcement, thousands of pottery vessels uncovered at excavation sites across Israel will now be examined with advanced scientific methods and catalogued as part of a joint project led by Dr. Anat Cohen Weinberger of the Israel Antiquities Authority and Prof. Alexander Fantalkin of Tel Aviv University. ...

According to the announcement, the research is being developed as a wide-scale national project. As part of it, the IAA said it is building a digital “kiln atlas” to consolidate the accumulated knowledge and make it available to researchers through a platform being developed by the authority’s digital technologies division. The statement says the atlas is intended to serve as a long-term research infrastructure for studying production, trade, and regional connections in the past.

For a related 2020 article by the lead researcher, see here.

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