The Children of the Fire. Past and present ways of making pottery and understanding animism in Mesoamerica.

Abstract (English)

Fire is an important part of ceramic production, nevertheless it is usually taken for
granted when studying and analyzing ceramics. Ethnoarchaeology,
experimentation and sensory archeology allowed us to grasp a better
understanding of the relationships entangled between fire-potter and pottery. An
extensive compilation of myths, sayings, and words in
p’ urhépecha allow us to identify ways of thinking and therefore ways of making. This
paper will show the connections found between the information told to Spaniards
and compilated through text and that preserved through traditional knowledge and
making. These connections strongly relate makers with their making imprinting on
this last ones part of the former ones ways of being.
All the above combined with the intricated production of a pottery decoration
called negative effect and the symbolism of the materials employed and the firing technique employed
made us though on the animistic conception of pottery, the agency of a pit and pyre kiln and the person status
among non-humans.