Fig 1.
Location of the main investigated Late Chalcolithic sites in greater Mesopotamia.
1. Arslantepe; 2. Tepecik; 3. Norşuntepe; 4. Samsat; 5. Kurban Höyük; 6. Hacınebi Tepe; 7. Zeytinli Bahçe Höyük; 8. Oylum Höyük; 9. Jerablus Tahtani; 10. Jebel Aruda; 11. Habuba Kabira South; 12. Tell Sheikh Hassan; 13. Tell Brak; 14. Tell Feres al-Sharqi; 15. Tell Leilan; 16. Tell Hamoukar; 17. Tell el-Hawa; 18. Grai Resh; 19. Nineveh; 20. Tepe Gawra; 21. Surezha; 22. Logardan; 23. Girdi Qala; 24. Gerdi Resh; 25. Tell Rubeidheh and Tell Hassan; 26. Tell Uqair; 27. Abu Salabikh; 28. Uruk; 29. Teppe Farukhabad; 30. Susa; 31. Chogha Mish; 32. Godin Tepe. Map: M. Karaucak through the topographic data courtesy of Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM), DOI:/10.5066/F7K072R7.
Fig 2.
Examples of LC pottery from Arslantepe.
a. LC1-2 storage jars and kitchen wares; b. LC1-2 handmade Coba Bowl; c. LC3-4 wheel-finished cooking pot; LC3-4 handmade cooking pot; e. LC3-4 wheel-finished mass-produced bowls; f. LC3-4 wheel-finished red-slipped ware (RIB) small jar; g. LC5 wheel-made light-colored fine ware jarlet; h. LC5 wheel-made light-colored coarse ware mass-produced bowls; i. LC5 handmade red-black burnished ware high-stemmed bowl; j. LC5 handmade kitchen ware and storage jar. Image: Archive of the Missione Archeologica Italiana in Anatolia Orientale (MAIAO).
Fig 3.
Microscopic and macroscopic features of mass-produced bowls at the beginning and end of the LC3-4 phase, evidencing a diachronic increase in the use of the rotational kinetic energy.
Image: ÖAW-ÖAI / P. Fragnoli.
Fig 4.
a. LC3-4 handmade kitchen ware; b. LC3-4 wheel-finished kitchen ware; c. LC3-4 wheel-finished mass-produced bowl with potter’s mark; d. LC3-4 wheel-finished chaff-tempered smoothed ware; e. LC3-4 wheel-finished red-slipped burnished ware; f. LC 5 wheel-finished light-colored fine ware (internal side of the foot of a high-stemmed bowl; g. wheel-finished light-colored fine ware (internal side of a jarlet); h. LC5 wheel-finished mass-produced bowl; i. neck of a LC5 wheel-finished light-colored semifine ware large jar. Image: Archive of the Missione Archeologica Italiana in Anatolia Orientale (MAIAO).
Fig 5.
Striations occurring with (a-b) or without (c-d) the use of rotating devices.
Image: ÖAW-ÖAI / P. Fragnoli.
Table 1.
Coefficient of variations (CV) calculated on LC3-4 to LC5 classes of vessels [64, 69].
Fig 6.
Selected micro-pictures illustrating the main petro-groups.
Image: ÖAW-ÖAI / P. Fragnoli.
Table 2.
List of the samples analyzed petrographically and related petrographic groups.
Table 3.
Main features of the petro-groups considered in this paper.
Fig 7.
a. Mean of the CVs calculated for each element within each LC sub-phase; b. Relationships between mean (x-axis) and standard deviation (y-axis) for all chemical elements within each LC sub-phase.
Table 4.
Parameters considered for assessing the three different properties of diversity at a petrographic level.
Fig 8.
Elemental variance within each LC sub-phase.
The variance of an element is equal to the trace of the variance-covariance matrix of the log-ratio transformed data using this element as divisor [91, 93].
Table 5.
Major (weight %) and trace element (parts per million) concentrations as well as associated means, standard deviations (dev std), coefficients of variation (CV), skewness, kurtosis, elemental variance and total variation within each LC sub-phase.
Fig 9.
Skewness and kurtosis calculated for each element within the LC1-2 (a), LC3-4 (b) and LC5 (c).
Fig 10.
Relationships between elemental CVs and ceramic wares/manufacturing techniques found in the LC1-2 (a), LC3-4 (b) and LC5(c).
Fig 11.
Relationships between elemental variances and ceramic wares/manufacturing techniques found in the LC1-2 (a), LC3-4 (b) and LC5(c).
Table 6.
Average CVs calculated on each element according to the different ceramic classes, manufacturing techniques and production rates occurring in the LC1-2, LC3-4 and LC5 phases.
Table 7.
Elemental variance and total variation according to ceramic classes, manufacturing rates and production rates.
Table 8.
Average CVs calculated on each element according to the different ceramic wares occurring in the LC3-4 and LC5 phases.
Table 9.
Elemental variance and total variation according to the different ceramic wares occurring in the LC3-4 and LC5 phases.
Table 10.
Values of the diversity parameters considered for each LC sub-phase.
Table 11.
Values of the diversity parameters considered for the different ceramic wares and manufacturing techniques within each LC sub-phase.
Table 12.
Values of the diversity parameters considered for the different handmade and wheel-finished ceramic wares of the LC3-4 and LC5.