Petrographic studies of the sperrings ceramics from South-Western Karelia

The purpose of the study is to determine whether or not there are differences in the composition of the molding masses of the Sperrings ceramics depending on the geographical area of the settlements. The task was to determine the structure and material of ceramic fragments from the Sperrings settlements in the territory of the Ladoga region of Karelia. For petrographic study 14 fragments were selected, mainly parts of the vessel walls, decorated with the main types of ornamentation: imprints of fish vertebrae (2), indented lines (7), rope (2) and comb (3) stamps. Research of the ceramic fragments was carried out using ground specimens and a binocular microscope MBS-1 with 16, 24 and 140 magnification. A large part of the studied ceramic fragments (10) had a composite structure comprising hydromicaceous and smectite-hydromicaceous lean clays, although this clay is of worse quality and was less frequently used to make the Sperrings ceramics from the Onega Lake basin settlements. The test of 11 out of 14 studied fragments of the Sperrings ceramics from the archaeological sites of the north-eastern and north-western Ladoga region showed that only crystalline rock screes was used as a thinner, which has direct analogies with the utensil from the Onega Lake basin. In two samples, an admixture of chamotte (crushed ceramics) was recorded, which may be due to the influence of an earlier layer of combed ceramics found in the settlements of the south-eastern Prionezhye region.