Presentations

Skill, one of the important aspects in craft production, has not been well studied due to methodological difficulties to assess it through archaeological evidence. Recently, skill has drawn increasing attention since it can be mobilized to understand “communities of practice”, where apprentices with varying degrees of skills learn the knowledge and techniques required for craft production. In this paper, I present detailed observations on the painting skill of six complete pottery vessels with the identical motifs from the 5th mill. BCE Chalcolithic site of Tall-e Bakun A (Fars province, Iran) that are curated at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. I examine skill differences at Tall-e Bakun A and extract diagnostic skill markers to be applied to the analysis of painting skills at other contemporary sites in Fars province. Finally, diachronic changes in the distribution of skills will be presented. Investigations of skill contribute to a general history of “communities of practice” that engaged in the making of pottery.