The Foundation for Archaeological Research in the Land of Israel (FARLI) “announce[d] the launch of its newest Project: The FARLI Ancient Pottery Database. In the spirit of FARLI’s goals to promote the archaeological research of the land of Israel and the southern Levant, and to develop new technological tools in the service of archaeology, … This website is an ever growing picture-based database of the pottery of the Ancient Near East. The pottery assemblages are divided into geographical areas, periods of use, types and ceramic families and includes valuable information on each vessel such as; measurements, special features, parallels and bibliographic references.”
Though focused on Israel/Palestine and Lebanon, there are also artifacts from the Aegean, Anatolia and Egypt. The interface is fairly straightforward and adequate. One can search for keywords or browse along a hierarchical path: region –> period –> pottery category –> pottery group. Browsing is not enabled for archaeological sites. Bibliographic references are only sometimes included; archaeological context and provenance too is mostly missing (e.g., Hellenistic radial oil lamps). Simple measurements are given but no scale is present in artifact photos. Basically, it is a type collection that still is very much under construction. I hope it will be completed more, both regarding the scope of examples/types and information on individual pots.
We thank you for the review! The site is indeed always under constant construction. New vessels are added almost on a daily basis, and now you can be updated via an RSS feed found on the site.
Missing details will also be completed as time progresses. Currently the site holds some 100 pictures of pottery vessels and the numbers just keep growing.
You can also receive updates on FARLI and archaeological news on the FARLI Facebook page:
A HREF=”http://www.facebook.com/pages/FARLI-The-Foundation-for-Archaeological-Research-of-the-Land-of-Israel/224557241029/” target=”blank”>The Foundation for Archaeological Research of the Land of Israel on Facebook