Via archaeology, much is learnt about historic cultures through the analysis of shard fragments or complete pottery forms. The function of such ceramic objects can reveal much about the way people went about their everyday lives.
When deciding upon the shape to be made, the potter or designer will generally have in mind the purpose of the form, but will also allow aesthetic considerations to influence the form of the vessels, as well as an physical constraints, such as balance, the limits of the material and perhaps their own level of skill.
There are three main approaches to determining ceramic function in archaeology, which are also useful the design context.
• vessel form or morphology
how the characteristic shape itself affords a particular function
• vessel performance
how the execution of the work affects it’s function
• ceramic use-alteration.
how the experience of use alters function, both physically, aesthetically, contemplatively.
The morphological characteristics of an archaeological assemblage of ceramics, then, can be studied to understand how the vessels functioned, within the limits that such function can only be inferred at a general level. Ceramic function can also be looked at from a performance perspective. A ceramic vessel can have certain performance characteristics that make it useful for some tasks but not others. For example, a potter might form a vessel with very thick walls to make that vessel strong or durable. Thick walls, then, would increase a vessel's strength performance. At the same time, a thick-walled vessel would be heavy, and therefore decrease its transportability. Finally, the function of a ceramic vessel can alter through it’s use. For example, the pot may not be used for it’s intended purpose and be adapted for another, or an emotional bond may form between the user and the pot which transcends it’s intended function, so that it operates on multiple levels including that of aesthetic or ritual significance.
It is difficult to be exact about the function of every vessel, however it is likely that the making of each pot is approached with some fundamental ideas about it’s use. These will include: It’s weight, when full of water or food, or when it is empty. The way in which it must be stood so that it is stable, or tilted to pour, and the way it is held. Many similar pottery forms can be used for a variety of purposes, especially for storing food.
Arising from close visible relationships between human and pot form morphology, most ceramic forms are made to function in relation to particular parts of our body. Chalice like forms , for example, are obviously made to fit between the hands. Form and function will, therefore, reflect different cultural uses. Some bowls are obviously meant to be held in one hand , others in between two palms, almost as a substitution for clasped hands. Wide rim plates may also be similarly categorised.
Fine lipped bowls are more difficult to be lifted by one hand, and uncomfortable, especially when full. The shape of some oriental rice bowls, intended to be held below the chin, are more conical, affording a centralised balance in between the splayed fingers of one hand that allows eating with the other. Other wider bowls, with footrings and more vertical sides will be used on tables. Many larger bowls have thickened or even flattened rims, some deliberately so to aid comfortable pressure of the thumb when lifting with one hand.
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form and function combinations reflect cultural uses.
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One may question whether it is indeed practical to lift some ancient forms by handles when full of liquid. One explanation may be that indeed these small, snug but robust handles were used to tie vessels to the sides of pack animals for transport. The rounded bases on any of these pots would make the vessel easier to pour when tilted, sit stably on uneven gound, and perhaps more easily guided into supporting rings on saddles. In these types of vesel, the neck opening is usually an indicator of the type of storage. narrow for liquid, to stop loss through splashing, and wider for solid grain storage. In other forms, round bases were used differently.The flange topped narrow neck on the Greek Alabastron, was used as a place to tie cord for it to be carried, full of bath oil or hung when not in use.
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| Archaic Greek Alabastron |
It is easy to imagine how this small sensual object has been considered as something to be handled, a welcome visual and tactile connection to the body in a setting where public bathing was a social activity. Different tactile connections appear in the teacups of the Victorian era and a century earlier, where delicate arabesque handles were fashioned in ways that could not accommodate the thinnest ladies finger. Instead, the device enforce a pinch grip holding of the teacup resulting in the characteristically ‘crooked’ finger of genteel bourgeois society.
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| Contorted body language scripted by the Victorian Tea cup handle |
Indian water pots visually reflect a scripted use in an almost topographic form. Wide swelling thin walled bellies, light when empty, keep the weight of water centered above a rounded base , that in addition to aiding pouring, fits snuggly into a ring placed on top of the head for carrying. The height of the rolled concave neck fits a hand comfortably, and although thin, it’s doubling back offers enough strength to allow the heavy pot to be lifted in one hand.
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| A Indian terracotta clay water pot and a more 'modern' metal one reflecting its traditional similar design features |
Some pottery forms, such as the ‘bourdalou’,the predecessor of today’s bedpan, are designed for concealment, their squeezed, inward curving bowl lip allowing the form to fit snuggly beneath the dress of Parisian’s who used them for relief during long sermons. Other forms where the ‘interior’ takes on significant importance include jelly molds and the beautiful interior forms of japanese tea bowls, designed not only to house a tea whisk comfortably, but to enhance the sound arising from it’s use.
These examples give some idea of both the rich variety of both functional object types and the way functionality can appear in relation to human interaction with ceramic forms. At the base level, a form may be rudimentarily instrumental.
At the most sophisticated level, all the senses are engaged in the use of an object. The challenge in designing utilitarian forms is not simply to satisfy a mechanical function, but to draw out the experience of it’s use into the aesthetic or transcendent domain , including the weight and balance of a form, whether empty of filled, tactility, the textural feel of the surface against the hands or lips, and of course the visual appearance of the shape, not simply from a single static view, but as the three dimensional form is moved through space,used and viewed at different angles.
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