Cooperation in Céramopôle in Aix-en-Provence
Tuesday 10 January 2012, by 2. CerAfIm works
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Céramopôle is a center for ceramics studies suggested and facilitated by three researchers from the Maison Méditerranéenne des Sciences de l’Homme (Mediterranean House of Human Sciences), each representing a specific period:
— Véronique François, researcher at LAMM (Medieval Mediterranean Archaeology Laboratory), Medieval and modern Christian and Muslim East;
— Michel Bonifay, researcher at CCJ (Camille Jullian Center), Antiquity and Late Antiquity;
— Maxence Bailly, teaching researcher at LAMPEA (Mediterranean Prehistory Laboratory (Europe-Africa)), Prehistory.
“Ceramics is a gilt-edged material for archeologists and historians due to the information it conveys on chronology, trade and society as well as skill transfer.
MMSH laboratories form a broad pool of abilities in this field, ranging over various chronological periods — Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Greco-Roman Antiquity, Late Antiquity, Western and Eastern Middle Ages, modern and ottoman periods — and a very wide geographical area — Southern Europe, Northern and Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea.
Thanks to Céramopôle, the “ceramology arena in Aix-en-Provence”, already deeply anchored in a large batch of national and international networks, is now endowed with a strong institutional framework."
Céramopôle has three purposes:
1. a reflection on archeological and historical issues as part of monthly meetings with ceramics experts. More particularly, such meetings are meant to compare the working methods of prehistory, antiquity and medieval ceramologists, to suggest new lines of research and to try new tools;
2. a reflection on major international projects for compiling ceramology digital encyclopedias;
3. training students on ceramology methods, in cooperation with the Ecole doctorale 355 “Espaces, Cultures, Sociétés” (Research School on “Spaces, Cultures, Societies”).
CerAfIm contributes to student training and to the ceramology encyclopedia compilation project.