Topic 10
Other Fired Clay Objects

Surveys and excavations in West Pasture have produced a number of fired-clay objects, herein called FCOs. These items are best described as ceramic artifacts that were made of local clay and hardened by fire, but which lack some or all of the attributes usually associated with pottery sherds:  tempering, finishing, and decoration. They are not pot fragments, which begs the question: What are they?

The archeological record in the Texas Panhandle is quiet on this matter, suggesting that these kinds of objects were not found in other locations or that they were regarded as something less than artifacts and not recorded. FCOs have been reported from sites in the coastal regions, indicating that clay was used in cooking. Fish scales in clay demonstrate that fish were wrapped and cooked in clay. Well-fired clay balls are also reported and appear to have been used for heating and boiling water, but this practice seems confined to coastal areas that lack rocks useable for stone boiling.

The FCOs recovered at West Pasture sites do not appear to be related to cooking.  We have found clay fragments that were used as construction materials and hearth linings in earthlodges and as plaster edges and caps of underground storage pits, but these uses of clay are not considered here.

One category of FCOs from our West Pasture sites is wads or tabs of clay that may have been fired to test the suitability of local clay deposits for pottery making. These objects are raw clay without any temper. They have no specific shape but show evidence of compression—pinching, flattening, and shaping. They do not appear to be part of a specific recognizable object, but fingerprint impressions may be observed on many of these items. For now, we consider them to be clay firing test samples. The collection also contains samples of partial clay balls with finger and palm impressions from forming the ball. This required the clay ball to be in a semi-plastic state when formed, dried, and then fired.

Fired clay balls and FCOs with indeterminate shape.  (1 and 2) Discard with fingerprint. (3)  Compressed or pinched. (4, 5 and 6) Fragments with grass impressions on bottom side of clay object. The latter are believed to represent impressions of the natural ground surface made when this clay was flattened out.

Raw clay ball (two views) exhibiting palm impressions from molding and compression. This specimen is from Feature 3 at the Three Toes Site.

The table below summarizes many other types of FCOs discovered during excavations conducted in West Pasture. All were recovered from trash-fill pits.

Other FCOs suggest some form of artistic expression. Some objects are molded in disc or saucer shapes, with evidence of a burned-out grass stem forming the hole in the center. One suspects these objects were created for use as personal jewelry, toys, or gaming pieces, but most of them do not exhibit any evidence of use-wear. These objects could have been created by adult potters, young apprentices, or children playing.

Some FCO pieces are likely casualties of the firing process. Perhaps these items were not allowed to dry enough, causing rapid expansion during the firing and resulting in fracturing. It is easy to imagine that the prehistoric potters would have experimented with various clays, shapes and sizes of clay objects, and firing techniques. 

These FCOs classified as discs. All are from Feature 3 at the Three Toes Site. (1) Disc made from raw clay displaying burned-out grass-stem hole and the protrusion of pushed out clay while inserting the stem. (2) Disc with fractured center that probably occurred during firing. (3) Thin disc exhibiting one smooth surface (top) and one surface with grass stem impression (bottom side). It too is likely a firing casualty.  

FCO with impression of a corn cob molded on a thin remnant of clay. Specimen is from Feature 3 at the Three Toes Site.

Other FCOs include tubular clay beads, small spiral rolled clay the size of a bead, and one round disc with evidence of wear, suggesting a gaming piece. It is notable that clay smoking pipe fragments were also recovered from the same trash-filled pits. 

FCOs that represent beads and bead-making attempts. (1 and 2) Small fragments of circular objects assumed to be clay beads because of the hole through the center. Specimen 1 is from pit Feature 2 at Whistling Squaw and Specimen 2 is from Feature 3 at Three Toes. (3) A small disc-shaped clay bead with evidence of use wear, from the borrow pit feature at Hank B. (4) A tubular clay bead from Feature 9 pit at Hank’s Site. (5) A spiral of flattened and rolled clay from Feature 3 at Three Toes. (6) A tubular clay bead from Feature 8 pit at Whistling Squaw.

The FCO from Lot 809 is unique. Is this a clay bead fragment with a drilled hole? Or is this a one-of-a-kind pot sherd with a hole drilled in the neck below the rim?

This FCO is a small, 3-cm diameter, circular disc with concave sides and a smoothed surfaces, perhaps from use wear. This specimen may be a gaming piece. It is from an eroding midden feature at the Three Toes Site.

The FCO from Lot 810.1 is a triangular fragment about 2 cm long and only 3 mm thick. This fired clay object exhibits an unusual surface treatment with a distinct impressed pattern. Modeling clay was used to make a negative impression of the FCO, and it shows what the original surface looked like. Is this pattern from woven fabric? We have seen nothing like this pattern on any other artifact, including pottery.

This unusual FCO is from Feature 3 at the Three Toes Site. On the right is modeling clay used to make a negative impression of the pattern on the FCO. Is this a pattern of woven fabric that was captured on a small piece of fired clay?

The interpretation of fired clay objects from the West Pasture sites can be straight forward, especially for objects such as beads or fragments of smoking pipes. The interpretation of many other FCOs, such as perforated disc, can be much more difficult. These object may eventually prove to be more common across the West Pasture site, perhaps providing evidence of use wear, then it would be easier to associate these FCOs with jewelry making or play toys. However, all of these objects were recovered from one large trash-filled pit feature at the Three Toes Site, and no similar objects have been found in other trash pits at the other sites.

Similar objects like the flattened disc, and indeterminate shaped objects, have been recovered at Hank B, and Macaluso trash pit at Whistling Squaw. The quantity is unmatched, as Three Toes pit feature contained far more than the other sites combined. Three Toes pit feature 3 produced an example of every described FCO in this presentation, in abundance. This suggest the production of pottery was conducted nearby, testing clay represented by clay balls, firing shaped objects, and creating objects of use. Perhaps these objects are the results of a nearby pottery firing-feature being cleaned out and discarded in this pit.