The successful 'recipe' for a long-lasting tradition: Nubian ceramic assemblages from Sai Island (northern Sudan) from prehistory to the New Kingdom

Sai Island, in the Nile in northern Sudan, has a series of settlement sites spanning the entire period from the eighth millennium BC through to the Eighteenth Dynasty of the Egyptian New Kingdom. This long sequence provides an excellent opportunity to study continuity and discontinuity in long-term pottery traditions. Ceramics from the varying cultural phases of the occupation reflect changing dynamics between broader regional social identities, notably Kerma to the south and Egypt to the north. Combining studies of petrography with trace element composition and chaine operatoire analysis, the authors present the first diachronic study of ceramic manufacture throughout the extended cultural history of Nubia, highlighting the varying manifestations of change and continuity. Keywords: Sudan, Nubia, ceramics, manufacture, continuity, chaine operatoire, petrography, instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA)
Introduction The concept of continuity implies the maintenance of given traits in artefactual assemblages and their reiteration through time. These traits commonly form a tradition or cultural inheritance. According to [...]