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POTMARKS FROM TELL TWEINI FIELD A

Archaeological and ethnographic sources provide evidence for the practice 
of marking objects of all sorts by a variety of means in many different cultures 
around the world. In the Eastern Mediterranean of the Late Bronze and Early 
Iron Ages, the preponderance of extant evidence is in the form of marks 
impressed, incised, or painted on ceramic vessels. The great majority of Late 
Bronze Age potmarks have been recovered from Cyprus and neighbouring Ras 
Shamra/Minet el Beidha, with smaller quantities found along the Eastern Mediterranean 
and Aegean littoral. Scholarly attention at first focused on incised and 
painted potmarks as signs of Aegean or Cypriot writing but recent work has 
more broadly considered the contexts and ductus (manner of application) of the 
marks with the aim of identifying their functions. Geographical focus has also 
broadened as increasing numbers of potmarks have been noted in archaeological 
assemblages from the Levant and, to a more limited degree, Anatolia. In 
the Iron Age, the prevalence of evidence shifts to the Levant. 
Here we present seventy-seven potmarks from Field A in the centre of Tell 
Tweini. This assemblage represents a significant addition to the hitherto published corpora of potmarks from the 
Late Bronze/Early Iron Age Levant. A more elaborate study was originally 
planned but the unstable situation in Syria has made further documentation and 
investigation impossible. We are aware of the preliminary character of this 
presentation but we nevertheless want to disclose these data now in the hope 
that this contribution – in anticipation of a more profound study in the future – 
will to some extent enhance the increasing evidence for marked vessels in 
general and their connotation for the circulation of goods in the Late Bronze/ 
Early Iron Age Eastern Mediterranean in particular.