History of Technology in India, Vol. I: From Antiquity to c. 1200 A.D. v1.c15.s6.3

v1.c15.s6.3

The PGW is a wheel turned pottery of extremely fine fabric. It is ash grey in colour and is painted with designs in black which are mostly linear such as groups of lines, sigmas, spirals etc. It is represented by bowls with vertical sides and dishes with incurved rim. The core of the pottery is uniformly grey but the surface colour sometimes changes into light orange as is evident from the specimens from Ahicchatra. Although the technique of producing the ceramic was not clearly known till recently, the experiments by K.T.M.. Hegde have been helpful in understanding it (Hegde, 1975, pp. 187-190). He observes: “After painting, the pots were stacked in a saggar. The gaps between the pots in the saggar were probably filled with goat droppings or some other carbonaceous material.......and sealed the saggar in a kiln, gently raising the temperature of the kiln to about 800°C and retaining the kiln at that temperature for some time, at least over twelve hours. In this way red ochre pigment was reduced into magnetite and the evenly baked PGW was produced”(Hegde, 1975, *Ibid*). Thus according to him, the black pigment of the painting is magnetite. The black slipped pottery which is found associated with the PGW at many north Indian sites, also belongs, technologically to the same class as the PGW. The black slip, according to Hedge, was produced by the application of liquid clay containing finely ground red ochres burnishing it and then firing the ware under reducing conditions (Hegde 1975, p.198)