[Terrapreta] The Reason for Pottery Shards in Terra, Preta.

[lou gold]

Tom,

If you watch the bbc documentary you will see the anthropologist state
clearly that the slight curvature of the pottery shard indicates "large
pots."
He actually holds one before the camera to illustrate. Also in the same
video you will see many, many layers of well-placed shards alternating with
soil. It does not appear as the random breakage that you describe.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1177691269867720140&q=secret+of+el+dorado&total=16&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

hugs,

lou



On Wed, Apr 2, 2008 at 3:41 PM, Gary Rondeau <grondeau at efn.org> wrote:

> I've always liked the "pottery as mulch" theory.  If you look at the
> picture of the excavation here:
> http://www.acresusa.com/toolbox/reprints/Feb07_TerraPreta.pdf
> you will see that most of the sherds have little curvature, suggesting to
> me that they were not made as "pots" but rather specifically for another
> purpose.  I've also read that most of the sherds are unfired - again
> suggesting a "low tech" requirement where the higher strength of a fired
> object is not necessary.  If you consider the problems of weed and moisture
> control, you can see the logic in laying sheets of sun-baked clay around
> your seedlings.  But they break - get trampled into the dirt - and there you
> have it!  The bigger pieces would get used year after year.  I believe I ran
> across this hypothesis in some of Charles Mann's writings.
>
> Gary
>
>  The intense interest in, and speculation about, pottery has been amusing.
> > It
> > keeps coming up as an element of interest. From my reading of Amazonian
> > Dark
> > Earths and other references it may be a symbol of disposal practices but
> > it
> > is only one component of many, including food wastes and other sources
> > of
> > minerals and plant nutrients, that apparently went into terra preta. If
> > someone has the time and patience it would be useful to cite specific
> > archeological references and interpretations of the pottery issue.  I'm
> > sure
> > that it wouldn't be nearly as entertaining as the current thread of
> > speculation.
> >
> >
> > Tom
> >
>
>
>
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