Lo que ganamos con el fuego. Estudio arqueométrico de las temperaturas de cocción en alfarería prehispánica del Delta Superior del río Paraná (Argentina)

DI PRADO, V.; BONOMO M.; CONCONI, S.; CASTRO, C.; GENAZZINI, G.; SILVA, C.

Boletim do Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, Ciências Humanas

Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi

Lugar: Belem; Año: 2022 vol. 17 p. 1 - 18

1981-8122

in the Argentinean Northeast archaeology there are few studies that address the firing procedures of the pre-Hispanic pottery making and, up to now, no physical-chemical techniques have been applied to measure the microstructural transformations suffered by clays and mineral non-plastic inclusions during firing. In order to modify this situation, we applied X-ray diffraction, differential thermal and thermogravimetric analysis, and thermal expansion on 31 archaeological ceramic samples recovered at the Los Tres Cerros 1 and Cerro Tapera Vázquez sites (Upper Delta of the Paraná River). Most of the samples (i.e., vessels with restricted and unrestricted mouth, “campanas” and “spoon”) were firing attemperatures above 550ºC/650ºC and below 800ºC; four did not exceed 550ºC/650ºC and two were subjected to temperatures above 800/900ºC. These results, joined with ethnoarchaeological, experimental and archaeological evidence, allowed us to read into the wide range of firing temperatures detected ( 800ºC) as indicative of firing in open structures (i.e., bonfires or pits). In addition, this data allowed us to discuss different firing conditions hypothesis proposed in previous research and to develop an experimental program that will allows us to know different aspects of the pre-Hispanic firing procedures in the study area.