8.1.2. Tradition of Not Decorating Pottery

It is well known that the Iron Age (both Iron I and II) highland pottery in particular, and the pottery in the kingdoms of Israel and Judah in general, was non-decorated (e.g., Dever 1995, p. 205; Mazar 1992b, p. 290; Bloch-Smith and Nakhai 1999, p. 76).23 While practiced already in the Iron Age I, this is much more noticeable in the Iron Age II, when many of the nearby polities/cultures did use decorated pottery, sometimes extensively (Faust 2006a, pp. 41–48; 2013). Decoration on pottery is used to convey messages of various sorts (David et al. 1988; Faust 2006a, with additional references), and the lack of any decoration is a very suitable channel not only of a message of difference from other societies, but also of egalitarianism and simplicity. Many scholars referenced the lack of decoration as a characteristic of Israelite pottery (e.g., Dever 1995, p. 205; Mazar 1992b, p. 290; Bloch-Smith and Nakhai 1999, p. 76), so the mere phenomenon does not need a detailed discussion, and I will exemplify it with Building 101 at Tel 'Eton. This residency, destroyed by the Assyrian army in the late 8th century BCE, was some 225 m2 large (on the ground floor), and ashlar stones were embedded in the structure's corners and doorways (e.g., Faust et al. 2017). The wealth of the inhabitants was expressed also in the finds within the structure, which included some 200 complete pottery vessels, including dozens of storage jars, many of which were discovered with their content, clearly indicating that large quantities of surpluses were stored in this large dwelling. Remains of cedar, imported from Lebanon, and the composition of the faunal assemblage, are also indicative of the inhabitant's wealth. Still, not a single vessel, out of some 200 pottery vessels uncovered in it, was decorated! This clearly exemplifies the phenomenon discussed here (and we will return to this example below).

What could be the explanation for the phenomenon? While a full discussion of style is beyond the scope of the present paper (e.g., Wiessner 1990; David et al. 1988; Faust 2002), suffice it here to refer, as an illuminative example, to an interesting parallel. A similar phenomenon of lack of decoration, though in a completely different time and place, was observed by Ivor Noel-Hume (1974, p. 108). He noticed that the earliest English delftware (in London) was usually elaborately decorated, but after the civil war potters began to produce undecorated plain vessels. Only after the restoration in 1660 did decorated pottery become popular again. Deetz (1996, p. 81) summarized this trend: "Puritan attitudes toward decoration of everyday objects might have had an effect on the delftware industry in the London area in the form of a reduction of the amount of decorated pottery before the Restoration." Deetz (1996, pp. 81–82), furthermore, attributes the lack of decoration on various artifacts in Anglo-America to Puritan attitudes. It seems to me that the situation in Iron Age Israel was

<sup>20</sup> The Siloam Inscription does not mention the king, and cannot be regarded as royal in this sense.

<sup>21</sup> Notably, other evidence for writing is found (like the above mentioned ostraca), so it cannot be claimed that illiteracy is the cause for the pattern.

<sup>22</sup> Such inscriptions would probably be found in the future in some special circumstances, e.g., in non-Israelite regions of the kingdom of Israel or in palatial contexts (and rarely, perhaps even in Israelite cities or villages). The general pattern, however, seems substantial, and it is not likely to be affected by such (expected) future discoveries (cf., also Na'aman 2002, p. 94).

<sup>23</sup> Slip and burnish are not regarded here as decoration.

somewhat similar, and that we are witnessing a process in which an ethos, even if of a different type, is responsible for the 'simple' pottery and for the lack of decoration.24
