February 10, 2015 — According to a new study conducted by York University and Queen’s College in New York City, the introduction and expanded use of pottery in the Americas was largely due to social factors. It had been previously thought that pottery developed as an adaptive response for the containment of foodstuffs. While hunter-gatherers of the northeastern American Continent utilized a large variety of wild animal and plant foodstuffs, it seems that pottery developed specifically as a method of handling fish and fish oil.
Reliance on a common living area allowed for an abundance of aquatic resources and pottery was thus used in group gatherings along river banks. While she was a research fellow at York University, Dr. Karine Taché (now of Queen’s College, in New York City) undertook the analysis of nearly 3,000 year-old potteries, taken from 33 different sites around the northeastern United States and Canada. Specifically, she was looking for residues on the pots that would indicate their prior purpose and the specific items they used to hold. By testing for bulk carbon, nitrogen isotopes and compound specific isotopes, as well as identifying lipids on the containers, Taché was able to ascertain that a great number of the pots once held fish and other aquatic species. It is also believed that the pots were used to store fish oil and other nutritious supplements. Taché explained the importance of her findings beyond the mere fact that the pots once held marine animals and the products made from them.
Read the full story at New Historian