Food habits and social identity during the archaic age: chemical analyses of organic residues found on pottery vessels from the messapian settlement of San Vito dei Normanni (South-Eastern Italy)

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Abstract

Food preparation and consumption are strictly connected to everyday life, but they can be also viewed as indicators of human relations on many different levels: social, economic and political. The identification of vessels function is, therefore, an important source of information in the study of the practices related to eating and drinking, as well as in the investigation on the relationship between food habits, status, power and identity in the context of ancient societies (Goody 1982; Dietler 1996; Dietler, Hayden 2001; Bray 2003).Recent developments in chemical analysis of visible and absorbed organic residues in archaeological ceramics have opened up new perspectives in the study of pottery use (Pollard, Heron 1996; Evershed et al. 1997; 2002). The chemical characterization of the foodstuff cooked, consumed and stored in ancient vessels can be of crucial importance in determining vessels use, especially when the results are combined with contextual data: archaeozoological and palaeobotanical remains, shape and size of vessels, use-alteration analysis, pottery distribution.We report here on a study on food habits during Archaic age in the Messapian settlement of San Vito dei Normanni (south-eastern Italy), integrating chemical analysis of organic residues by Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) with the problems in determining the actual use of pottery vessels from archaeological contexts. In the framework of a contextual approach the traditional examination of the pottery was supported by a series of analytical techniques: analysis of technological, morphological and stylistic characteristics, use-alteration and residue analysis.

Autore Pugliese

Tutti gli autori

  • F. Notarstefano; M. Lettieri; G. Semeraro; L. Troisi

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Anno di pubblicazione

2011

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ISBN

978-3-642-14677-0

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