BS: Oldest pottery!

Subject: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Bill D
Date: 28 Jun 12 - 06:33 PM

story here

"Jun 28, 5:35 PM (ET)

By DIDI TANG

(AP) This undated image made available by Science/AAAS shows one of the pottery fragments recovered from...
Full Image

BEIJING (AP) - Pottery fragments found in a south China cave have been confirmed to be 20,000 years old, making them the oldest known pottery in the world, archaeologists say.

The findings, which will appear in the journal Science on Friday, add to recent efforts that have dated pottery piles in east Asia to more than 15,000 years ago, refuting conventional theories that the invention of pottery correlates to the period about 10,000 years ago when humans moved from being hunter-gathers to farmers."



Many implications about who & what we are....

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Rapparee
Date: 28 Jun 12 - 06:35 PM

Yeah! Cool, ain't it?

I'll betcha it was used for fermenting wild grains.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Bill D
Date: 28 Jun 12 - 06:40 PM

I'd not be surprised!

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Mr Red
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 09:37 AM

Yea if it wasn't for the fact that China invented boiled water and Europe invented fermentation.
Both prove if, or not, that a particular source of water is potable. Hence the Chinese intolerance of alcohol and the European tolerance thereof. But that is all down to dosage at the end of the day binge.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 10:22 AM

Thanks for the link, Bill.

If you've ever visited a museum of decorattive arts, gone to the Housewares section of a department store or strolled through an antiques mall, it is obvious that humans have a deep need for pretty dishes. It doesn't surprise me that it goes back 20,000 years.

There probably were dishes before that, but the glaciers have ground them all up, and we'll never know.

I'm intrigued by the tiny bumps on the pottery in the picture. They are not the result of fingers pressing the clay - they are decoration. Ah, the basic human needs - food, water, shelter, sex and decorating.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 11:03 AM

To get back to the opening post, I would question whether the fragments found were actually pottery. It depends on how you define the term.

If you look at the photo in the article, you'll see that the fired shards bear the impression of straw-like material.

The general consensus among archaeologists is that basket making predates pottery, and that some cultures lined their baskets with wet clay to make them less porous. When worn out baskets were tossed into fires, the clay linings were heated, leaving fired shards behind. But are those shards really pottery?

I don't think so. They're clay basket liners which were fired by accident, not intentionally. The use of unfired clay as a basket sealant was an intermediate step in the evolution of pottery, but not actual pottery-making. That innovation occurred when someone decided to forego the basket and make a vessel directly from moist clay and then intentionally place it in a fire pit.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 11:34 AM

That certainly may be the case, B-dub. You would know more than most of us.

It is still interesting as an early example of using clay. Perhaps it was 'only' 15,000 years ago when someone made the first real vessel. I suppose all the Facebook posts from 20,000 years ago saying: "Gee...look what I just invented!" have disappeared by now. ;>)

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 05:35 PM

I've also observed traditional pottery making in the Gurage homeland of Ethiopia and their usual practice, back in 1967, was to pack the unfired clay pots into a pit lined with straw and charcoal. After the pots were fired they often had impressions of straw on them as well.

Most likely the first pots were designed to carry water. They later became useful for boiling water, and brewing coffee and tea.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: gnu
Date: 29 Jun 12 - 06:17 PM

Pottery dates back far more thousands of years. "Scientists" and "Archeologists" haven't found such because they can't find shit that wore out before they found it.

Come on eh? *I* found the oldest shard of pottery does not mean it's the oldest. Ya got scientists and archeologists and doctors and lawyers and politicians... and, then ya pay an engineer shit money to build the world... to build the ovens to fire pottery... that youse think last forever. Use some logic eh?

And, logic is not the sole realm of the philosopher. The first philosopher was an engineer... or was the first engineer a philosopher? Disregarding the beaver arguement, of course. All you eager beavers write a term paper on that and have it in to me just after mid-term exams.

Oldest pottery! So what? It may the oldest found. So what?

Now. Some of that is tongue in cheek, but some isn't. To me, as an engineer and a philosopher, I just take a careful look at such and ponder. Most of all, if I can attempt to make a joke, albeit obtuse, I will always do so. Engineers and Philosophers are nothing without a sense of humour. And, I crack me up at times.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: gnu
Date: 30 Jun 12 - 01:52 PM

Apparently, I crack me up a lot easier at 19:17h on a Friday night. >;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Gurney
Date: 01 Jul 12 - 12:32 AM

If the 'pottery' is 20,00 years old, wouldn't that then be the people passing through that part of the world on their way to the Americas and other Pacific rim countries, as they are now?

I have an idea that the current residents came later, but I stand to be corrected. Can't be bothered to research it.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: ollaimh
Date: 01 Jul 12 - 12:20 PM

the first fermentation is african not european, at least the first found. chinses have fermentation that equals european in date. egyptian seems to be the oldest mass produced fermentation. both beer and wine. their first wine was made from coffee fruits. the bean had a bitter cherry. so it would have had caffine in the wine. i am not sure about grapes as wine.

pottery can be used to cook in. done right you can boil water in a clay pot and boil stuff. and you can put pots in fires like a small oven. ;ikely the first use. we have been cooking as long as we have had fire.

the oldest humans in the americas could be thirty thlousand years ago on some tenious evidence, but some can be proved for twenty thousand years ago. they came from east asia. their are direct dna liks, but they link to north asian tribes, not the chinese.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 02 Jul 12 - 08:15 AM

"The general consensus among archaeologists is that basket making predates pottery..."

There may be factual evidence for that, but I don't think it likely. Consider the skill and amount of effort it takes to make a basket. You have to gather the right vegetable fibers and devise a system of weaving and knotting to make a useful product. Some baskets we see are very complex and required hours of work.

Then think about making a clay vessel - find some clay, squish it into shape, put it in a fire. Seems simpler and more likely to happen, does it not?

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 02 Jul 12 - 11:48 AM

The Chinese invented "boiled water"??!

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 02 Jul 12 - 04:17 PM

Yes, they did. They also invented sneezing.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Gurney
Date: 02 Jul 12 - 05:31 PM

Ah. I remember asian 'flu.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 03 Jul 12 - 12:16 AM

The Chinese may have invented sneezing, but farting is the province of the Irish.

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 03 Jul 12 - 09:57 PM

I'm not at all sure whether pottery or baskets came first. There are good arguments for either. But firing a clay pot is a jump in technology, I'm thinking than weaving a basket.

I'm even less convinced that the Irish can lay first claim to the fart. Breaking wind is more of a universal attribute of all species.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 04 Jul 12 - 12:16 PM

Oh, i don't know, we went to a family reunion where there were people in their 90's, and every decade of ages down to the aughties for the kids under 10, it was GREAT, but Mom was by FAR the oldest pottering around!

Subject: RE: BS: Oldest pottery!
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 04 Jul 12 - 03:58 PM

Hi, Charley. "Firing a pot" sounds high-tech, but others have pointed out that people probably made pottery accidentally by building a fire on clay soil. One day they were taking the stegosaurus ribs off the grill, and the ground below had turned to a useful-looking hard substance.

First they pried up the hard layers and used them as paleolithic fribees. 20,000 years later, somebody thought of making the first container. Easy peasy.