A01=Thomas J. Blumer
american indians
anthropology
archaeology
artifacts
Author_Thomas J. Blumer
Category=AGA
Category=WFS
ceramics
ceremonial complex
climate
Early Archaic
Eastern United States
environment
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_crafts-hobbies
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
excavations
farming
fauna
fishing
geology
habitats
hunting
Indigenous societies
material culture
Middle Archaic
Middle Woodland
migration
mounds
native american art
native american artifacts
native american traditions
native americans
north carolina
North Carolina chipped-stone point types
Paleoindians
plants
Pleistocene
pottery
projectile points
public archaeology
settlement
shell middens
shellfish
south
southeastern archaeology
subsistence
violence
warfare
water transportation
woodland indians
Woodland Period
Product details
- ISBN 9780817350611
- Weight: 424g
- Dimensions: 165 x 238mm
- Publication Date: 22 Dec 2003
- Publisher: The University of Alabama Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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When Europeans encountered them, the Catawba Indians were living along the river and throughout the valley that carries their name near the present North Carolina-South Carolina border. Archaeologists later collected and identified categories of pottery types belonging to the historic Catawba and extrapolated an association with their protohistoric and prehistoric predecessors. In this volume, Thomas Blumer traces the construction techniques of those documented ceramics to the lineage of their probable present-day master potters - or, in other words, he traces the Catawba pottery traditions. By mining data from archives and the oral traditions of contemporary potters, Blumer reconstructs sales circuits regularly traveled by Catawba peddlers and thereby illuminates unresolved questions regarding trade routes in the protohistoric period. In addition, the author details particular techniques of the representative potters - factors such as clay selection, tool use, decoration, and firing techniques - which influence their styles. In assessing the work, David G. Moore, of Warren Wilson College, states, ""This book represents an enormous body of work concerned with a significant topic - the persistence of the Catawba Indian pottery tradition. Using his extensive fieldwork and a narrative presentation, the author juxtaposes the evolving ceramic technology with a fascinating discussion of the role of pottery in changing Catawba economy from the 18th and continuing into the 21st century.
Thomas John Blumer is a retired ethnohistorian and author of Bibliography of the Catawba. William Harris is a respected leader of the Catawba Indian Nation.
