Development of pottery paste recipes in the middle and late bronze ages (on the materials of catacomb, Abashevo, Voronezh, and timber-grave cultures in the don forest-steppe)

The paper is devoted to the analytical investigation of the Bronze Age cultures' pottery from the forest-steppe area of the Don basin. The results of three analytical methods (microscopic visual, X-ray structural, and chemical) are presented. Totally over 50 vessels from stratified burial associations and settlements have been analysed. They belong to the Middle Don Catacomb culture, the Don-Volga Abashevo culture, Voronezh culture, and the Don Timber-grave cultures. The late Catacomb, Abashevo, Voronezh, and Timber-grave potters used for making paste pure plastic clay with grog admixture. It is shown that by the period of formation of the Late Bronze Age Timber-grave culture on the Middle Don specific technology of pottery-making had been worked out by the craftsmen of the Middle Don Catacomb culture.