Long before anyone built a kiln on purpose, the ground itself may have shown people how. A new study argues that a wave of prehistoric wildfires in the southern Levant, more than 9,000 years ago, scorched the region so thoroughly that it left behind naturally baked clay — and that Neolithic communities, watching the aftermath, […]

The more than 50,000 pottery fragments found at the Hüde I site, on Lake Dümmer (Lower Saxony, Germany), are providing an unprecedented insight into how the transition from a hunter-gatherer lifestyle to agriculture occurred in northern Europe. Researchers have identified pottery from at least five different cultures, showing much more intense contacts than previously thought […]

The question of whether brands are an invention exclusive to modern capitalist societies has received a resounding answer from an international team of researchers: they already existed at least 3,200 years ago. A study led by Marta Luciani of the University of Vienna and published in the journal PLOS One has documented how painted pottery […]