J5 Ceramics
General character of ceramics in Unit J5 stratum 14 and stratum 12

Back to top: J5 Ceramics General character of ceramics in Unit J5 stratum 14 and stratum 12

Review of current situation

The ceramics from these two strata are relatively homogenous in their shapes. In stratum 14 with 332 shape types there are 43% bowls, 39% jars and 4.5% cups. In stratum 12 we excavated a total of 1799 shapes and if only one feature is looked at(f209), because it contained the largest number of sherds in the stratum, then we have a total of 518 shapes. In this feature 44% are bowls, 42% jars and 3% cups. If instead the rest of the stratum is taken as a whole then there are 868 shapes that can be categorized (for a total of 1799 shape sherds that can be identified in the stratum). Among the 868 shape sherds there are 44% bowls, 37% jars and 4% cups. This appears to confirm the interpretation based on the stratigraphy that the plaza build up occurred because of the blocking of the southern end of the plaza and the resulting deposits washed into the plaza from surrounding areas. From the ceramics we can further hypothesize that the areas from which the ceramics were washed into the plaza were homogenous in nature, that is the function of those areas was similar if not the same.