Mesolithic and neolithic ceramics in the central Sudan, 8th-3rd Millenium B.C. : with special reference to the physico-scientific approach

Abstract

This dissertation describes a course of research undertaken by the present writer at the Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, Southampton University, the goal of which was to shed further lights on technological aspects of Mesolithic and Neolithic ceramics in the central Sudan. Since Arkell's work in 1940's and early 1950's, the picture of the Mesolithic and Neolithic ceramics in the central Sudan (apart from small-scale attempts of T.R. Hays [1971], H. Nordstrom [1972], T.R. Hays and F. Hassan] [1974], D.F. Williams [1982] De Paepe [1986] and M. Chlodnicki [1989]) has remained inconspicuous. The origin(s) of these ceramic assemblages as well as the cultural mechanisms articulating the various human groups inhabiting the central Sudan during the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods are not obvious. The technological aspects of ceramics have not been fully investigated and utilized. Nonetheless, some conclusions have been put forward and sometimes accepted as working hypotheses. Releasing itself from the emphasis on the traditional artifactual comparative analyses, the present work attempts to bring the physico-scientific approach-in a wider scale-to the study of the Mesolithic and Neolithic ceramics in the central Sudan by applying a series of the most recent techniques of petrological, chemical (Goethite Norm calculations), X-ray diffraction, thermal (DLT) and computer analyses to the selected data (cf. chapters 3-8). (X-ray-fluorescence spectrometry), petrochemical Ample samples have been chosen in the light of the beset objectives in an attempt to attain satisfactory conclusions. Looking at the Mesolithic and Neolithic ceramics in the central Sudan from a broader perspective, in order to enhance our knowledge about the unexplored aspects of this field of research, to fill the gaps and eliminate the weak sides of the previous small-scale endeavours, the present programme, which is rather wider in scope, has been designed to clarify the situation. As a result of the fabric analyses carried out in the present work, technological differences were observed and even some ceramic groups were distinguished in the chronological developments (see supra and chapters 3-11). Moreover, using a hypothetical model (cf. chapter 9) and utilizing the results of the physico-scientific analyses, the present research has shed new lights on the nature of the Mesolithic and Neolithic ceramic distribution in the central Sudan at both intraregional and interregional levels.

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