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One day we went out to a "pottery village" to see the way current-day pots are being made - still just as they were made at the time of the burials thousands of years ago. (Left: one of the ones we uncovered at the dig) |
| The newly-made pots, created from clay dug off the banks of the local Mun (Moon) river, and fortified with a "temper" or grog made of rice hulls and baked clay, are formed with a paddle and an "anvil" - a mushroom shaped device jammed into the clay - on the stump of a tree. The potter walks around a pot sitting on a stump instead of turning it on a wheel. |  |
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The pots are placed out to dry... |
| And then taken in a cart to the spot where they'll be fired. |
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They're placed on a bed of dry banana and palm fronds, covered with rice straw. |
| The firing takes about 45 minutes. |  |
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And then they're finished, baked hard and red, and ready to use! |
