# Rocks and clay: Potters’ technological choices within the cultural dynamics of Bronze Age Kazakhstan

## TL;DR

This paper explores how Bronze Age potters in Kazakhstan made technological choices that reflected both local traditions and broader cultural connections.

## Contribution

The study introduces a combined macro- and micro-scale approach to analyzing ceramics, emphasizing human agency in technological practices.

## Key findings

- Site-specific potting technologies were identified in the Zhetysu region.
- Some technological traits persisted across time and space despite high genetic turnover.
- Ceramic analysis reveals insights into interregional cultural dynamics during the Bronze Age.

## Abstract

Through regular interactions with their neighbors, diverse groups inhabiting areas along the Inner Asian Mountain Corridor during the Bronze Age formed dynamic interregional networks that saw the proliferation and persistence of shared material cultures over vast geographic areas. In this paper we advocate for ceramics analyses that combine both macro- and micro-scale technological studies alongside those of style, in order not to lose sight of the actual people who drove defining transformations in the Bronze Age. We present a petrographic study of pottery from the Zhetysu region, southeastern Kazakhstan, to examine diachronic technological traditions with a special focus on routines of selection and raw material processing. Our results demonstrate site-specific potting technologies as well as traits that transcend both time and space across episodes of high genetic turnover in the human population.