Period: Iron Age (500 BC - 700 AD)

Project titel: Rekonstruktion af keramik fra jernalderen med central kerne af plantemateriale samt undersøgelse af godsets nedkølings- og termoeffekt.

Researcher: Annine Moltsen, Archaeologist.

Email: nok(at)nokam.dk

Year: 2008

Abstract:

The Iron Age Kitchenware consisted of almost as many different containers as in our days. Some were made of wood, but by far the most were made of clay - ceramics in other words. There were pots for all kinds of purposes - pitchers, cups, vases, jars, storage vessels, serving dishes, cheese pots and so on. From enormous storage vessels for grain to tiny salt bowls. The shapes of the pots are usually familiar from the present day and more often than not we can simply guess what they were used for. But maybe more than the shape of vessels determined their use?

  
Ordinarily prehistoric ceramics were made of clay mixed with baked sand, crushed granite or pulverized plant materials, which meant the pots are less likely to crack when drying or baking. However there were rare exceptions to this standardised Iron Age pot mixture. On an Iron Age settlement in the Northern part of Zealand, shards of a unique kind of pots were found  - The ceramics walls had a thick core of coarse plant material, which apparently consisted of remains from the harvest - straw, kernels and weeds.
What could be the reason for this strange clay mixture? Why were the pots apparently insulated with plant materials? Were they designed to keep something hot or perhaps rather cold?

Archaeologist Annine Moltsen will try to answer these questions through a series of experiment with storing fluids in replicas of the mysterious pots. In a time with no refrigerators a ceramic pot which could keep milk or beer cold, would have been more than welcome. Maybe the thermos was really invented in the Iron Age?

Reference number HAF 21/08