Evidence of continuous pottery production during the late Byzantine period in the Studenica Monastery, a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Abstract

A collection of 63 pottery shards excavated at the Studenica Monastery, Serbia, originating from two distinct cultural strata (late 12th until the late 13th century, and the 14th and the first half of 15th century) was subject of this work. Mineralogical and chemical composition of body and glaze and production technology of investigated pottery were determined combining optical microscopy, inductively coupled plasma-optical emission and wavelength dispersive X-ray fluorescence spectrometry, Fourier transform infrared and micro-Raman spectroscopy, high-resolution synchrotron powder X-ray diffraction and multivariate statistical analysis. In addition, clay rod with traces of glaze from the kiln found within the Monastery complex was investigated. The firing temperature was estimated at 600–700 °C for the most of cookware and at 800–1000 °C for tableware. Pottery, made of non-calcareous clay, was covered with transparent lead based glaze and copper and iron were used as colorants. Combining results of all used techniques no significant differences in mineralogical and chemical composition among samples from two cultural strata were identified indicating continuous pottery production process from 13th until 15th century in Studenica.