One thousand years of tuyere production at the Royal City of Meroe, Sudan

This paper examines the technology involved in the production of domestic ceramics and technical ceramics related to iron production at the archaeological site of Hamadab, Sudan. Recent investigation of the slag mounds located in the vicinity of the Upper Town, which is described as the urban core of Hamadab, has unearthed large quantities of domestic and technical ceramics alongside the debris of iron smelting (Humphris 2014; Humphris and Rehren 2014). These slag mounds are dated to the post-Meroitic period (ca. AD 350-550), which leads to the speculation that Hamadab might have served as a centre of iron production after the decline of the Kingdom of Kush (Humphris 2014: 124). Yet, our understanding of the iron production and its implications to the nature of the post-Meroitic society remains largely obscure. With this in mind, a selection of domestic and technical ceramics such as tuyѐres and furnace linings recovered from three slag mounds are analysed by thin-section petrography and SEM-EDS. By studying the domestic and technical ceramics separately, we aim at exploring the compositional and technological variability that exist within their respective assemblage. Meanwhile, by comparing these two types of ceramics, we are able to learn about the technical choices made by ancient potters with specific emphasis on the selection of raw materials and their related refractory properties, and to highlight the similarity and/or difference in how the production of domestic and technical ceramics was organised. Ultimately, we hope that the analysis of the domestic and technical ceramics will shed light on the relationship between ceramic and iron production, and more importantly, offering us a glimpse into the socio-political and cultural developments of the post-Meroitic society under which these ceramics were manufactured.