Hot take that old pottery sherds tell better stories than whole pots

I was out near Santa Fe last spring on a volunteer dig, and we pulled up this tiny rim piece from a broken bowl. Nothing fancy, just a little brown curve with a thumbprint still visible on the edge. Thing got me thinking how the whole pots in museums feel so cleaned up and fake, like they lost their real life. Meanwhile this sherd had carbon crust from cooking, a little wear spot, and that thumbprint just hanging there. It's like the broken stuff is honest about how people actually lived, mess and all. Anyone else get more out of the broken pieces than the perfect ones?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_vera1mo ago

Wait, you pulled up a piece with a thumbprint still visible on it after all that time in the dirt? That's honestly wild, most of the stuff I've found is so worn down you can't tell if it was even touched by human hands. I totally get what you mean about whole pots feeling sanitized though, that thumbprint brings it back to a real person's life in a way a museum display never could.

cooper.taylor1mo ago

@the_vera yeah I was dumbfounded, probably the only mark I'll ever leave on history is my greasy fingerprints on some pottery shard.