FLUJO DE AIRE (Q)

Five local ware categories from the 1st millennium BCE were identified by the project based on fabric, form and perceived function. The material from the Bronze Age as well as the later Medieval and Modern periods have been excluded from this discussion of ware because they were not studied by the project in any great detail. The fabrics of the 1st millennium BCE found in the region are universally micaceous with black and opaque white inclusions

predominating. In many of the wares there is inconsistency in the color of vessels, with some whole examples having mottled surfaces and individual fragments displaying considerable variation in the color of the biscuit. There is a great deal of conservatism in the ceramic material

with local fabrics staying static even as new vessel forms and production techniques are introduced.

Common Wares: Common wares are a broad category that includes all undecorated,

utilitarian vessel forms produced in the local micaceous fabrics. These fabrics range in color from reddish-brown, gray to black with black and opaque white mica inclusions. The fabrics of these wares remain consistent throughout the 1st millennium BCE and, in the absence of

additional diagnostic features, they cannot be specifically placed in any one period. Examples of these wares from excavated contexts, such as at Saqanchia, have generally been identified as kitchen and table wares used in the preparation and consumption of food. Likely the fragments recovered by the survey were also used in this capacity, but no evidence of ancient burning has been discerned on any of the fragments we examined.

Fine Wares: Like common wares, fine wares are a broad category that includes all

decorated and specialty vessel forms produced in the survey-region. On average, the coarseness of fine ware vessels is less than common wares, but there was too much variation in our samples to make definitive categories from coarseness alone. For the purposes of dating, there are two subcategories of fine wares that are of particular interest to the survey: burnished wares and fluted wares.

Burnished Ware: Indicative of the Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age transition from the

12th to the 7th centuries BCE and persisting into the Hellenistic period, burnished ware is found in the full range of shapes at sites throughout western Georgia. Though the amount of burnishing can vary, the most commonly found examples have vertical burnished lines extending from the neck to the base with horizontally arranged lines often found on the neck and rim. The ware appears to be a further development of the polished wares common in the earlier phases of the

Bronze Age. This ware comes in rather fine, micaceous fabrics with black and opaque white mica inclusions. Surface color varies from weak red (Munsell 10R 5/4) to gray (Munsell 5YR 6/1) and black (Munsell 5YR 3/1 – 2.5/1) with vessels either being more or less consistently one color, especially black and gray vessels, or exhibiting a mottling of several colors. Whether intentional or not, this variation in surface is the result of variability and inconsistency in kiln temperatures.

“Channeled” and Fluted Wares: Channeled wares (in Georgian kanaluri meaning

“channel”) consist of fine ware vessels with vertical grooves impressed then fired, and they first appear at Vani during the 8th-7th centuries BCE. As fine wares, they appear in the same fabric types and in a range of vessel forms as the other fine ware pottery. These wares appear to be a further development of the designs of the burnished wares with the channeling replacing

burnishing on many vessel forms. Fluted wares are an intensification of channeled wares where the vertical lines are much more deeply impressed and become popular in the Classical and Hellenistic periods.

Storage Ware: Though functionally a type of common ware, storage wares have a

distinctive fabric and surface treatment that indicates a different technique of production from other common wares. Storage wares first appear in the mid 7th and extend into at least the 1st centuries BCE. The fabric is micaceous and extremely course with substantial walls that thicken over time. Exteriors are universally dark grey to black (Munsell 7.5YR 3/1 - 2.5/1) while the biscuit is orange to pinkish-red and the interiors are orange to brown. The storage wares of the Hellenistic are thicker and harder than the earlier Classical period examples, but maintain the same fabric type. The vessels made from this fabric have been interpreted as storage vessels for agricultural products, particularly the fermentation of wine. We also know that these vessels

were used as burial containers, though it is unclear if the vessels would have been specifically made for this purpose or re-used after first functioning as agricultural storage.

IV. CHRONOLOGY  

The chronological sequencing of the pottery that follows is divided into those periods attested by the material recovered by the Vani Regional Survey. For reference, figure 3.1 shows the regional chronologies and how they relate to Colchian, regional and extra-regional

chronological sequences. The sequences for Vani’s region are numbered as they have no specific designation different from the traditional chronologies.

IV.1. First Millennium BCE

The majority of the pre-medieval, locally produced material recovered by both the Vani Regional Survey and the Eastern Vani Survey can be dated no more precisely than the 1st

millennium BCE.9 _{The primary reason for this is an overall conservatism in ceramic production} with most common wares being produced in the same shapes and in the same micaceous grey or brown fabric, as evidenced by a number of excavated contexts of different periods at Vani. Phasing of ceramic production in and around Vani relies heavily on the presence of imported wares, which are used to categorize and date clear changes in the decoration and form of local wares. When imported wares are absent, or in the case of survey unable to be contextually linked with local wares, or when decoration and form are not recoverable from a fragment, it is

impossible to date more precisely than the 1st millennium BCE. Add to this the fact that most of the fragments recovered through survey are non-descript body sherds or heavily damaged by                                                                                                                

9 _{Of the 1,325 pre-mediaeval fragments collected by the Eastern Vani Survey, 739 (55.8%) can} be dated no more precisely than the 1st millennium BCE. In the gridded site collections of the VRS, better than 90% of the material was datable only to the 1st millennium BCE (n=6,812 fragments).