Salt and ceramic exchange in Western Britain during the first millenium B.C.

Morris, Elaine Lisk (1983) Salt and ceramic exchange in Western Britain during the first millenium B.C. University of Southampton, Doctoral Thesis.

Abstract

This thesis demonstrates the distribution of several prehistoric commodities by the characterization of the artifacts, the identification of their production locations, and the final deposition of those artifacts after transportation and use. The structures of these distributions are the results of the production and exchange systems maintained by the economic and social organization in existence during the first millennium B.C. in western Britain. By assessing these distributions, using quantitative analyses and statistical tests, it is possible to infer patterns of activity which reflect that organization. The artifacts selected include pottery vessels made under at least two different forms of production organization - a small-scale system for more limited or localized consumption of product, and a large-scale system for wider or regional consumption; and salt-drying containers from two different inland brine springs sources with one at Droitwich in Worcestershire and another in Cheshire. The production and distribution systems of both the pottery and the salt container types were examined diachronically through this period of a thousand years to discover whether there have been any changes in the organization of these activities. The techniques used to identify, measure, and compare these distributions include ceramic petrology to define the artifacts and locate their sources of production, quantification by weight, percentage, and relative index to measure the material distributed in proportional and comparable form, and regression analysis with correlation coefficients to assess the significance of the results. Social and physical constraints which may affect the distributions are discussed, modeled, and interpreted for many of the variations in these patterns. These factors can include the economic value given the commodities based on manufacturing time and effort (labour investment), consumer distance from source, transportation efficiency, and alternative commodity sources, as well as the social values placed on commodities for identification of group association or alliances. The latter aspects are particularly noticeable in the patterning of material residues resulting from the activities of groups organized by kin relationships, the system believed to have been prevalent during the period under study. It is by examining the structure of these particular exchange patterns that detailed information about the organization of this society can be deduced.

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