Jeff Lawrence on tue 27 may 97
Hi all,
Just wanted to report on a fun time near Mesa Verde.
Yesterday we performed the first firing of an Mesa Verde kiln in 600-800
years, depending on whether it was P1 or P3. No difference established in
archeology, so specululate away. And it didn't really take BLM that long to
approve it, though it must have seemed so to the organizers.
Woods Mesa is about 20 miles WNW of Cortez CO, and the site of over a dozen
trench kilns. The firing, which was attended by a mixed bag of 27 artists,
archeologists and interested parties was of 63 Mesa Verde replicas from
local clays. All ~400 kg of juniper fuel was gathered by hand or with the
help of a stone ax (not much help, either!). The kiln was 2m long, 1.2m wide
and 20cm deep. The first fire laid down a bed of coals, which received
sandstone shelving, leaving 3-5cm gaps for air flow between them. The bowls
were placed mouths down, cups bottoms to the wind and the interstices were
covered by potsherds, to maintain convection through the ware. Then, a
framework of fuel was erected across the setting and ignited from the middle
(otherwise this tends to be a cold spot). When this fuel burned down to
coals resting lightly on the pots -- don't poke the fire or the compacted
coals make for nothing but reduction -- the entire setting was smothered
with ~750kg of sifted damp soil.
Next day (this morning) we "unloaded" the kiln. Still a little warm, but
none of the charcoal was glowing. Results: mixed, due to underfiring, even
though our pyrometers showed 880C on the downwind side. I got two black on
white keepers (a bowl and a canteen), and will refire the others whenever I
get time to dig a trench locally.
If anyone is interested in firing black on white ware, the 6th Kiln
conference will be held June 12 just north of Santa Fe in Pojoaque
(pronounced Poe-whock-ay by some). $25 fee includes a barbecue. I'll post
more when I have it to hand.
Why do I feel so official when I use those metric units? And please don't
flame me for flaming an artifact. The Mesa Verde archeologists were
co-conspirators on the project.
Jeff
Jeff Lawrence
Sun Dagger Design
ph/fax 505-753-5913
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