Scherven brengen geluk: Aanwijzingen voor opzettelijk gebroken aardewerk

A large part of the pottery in ritual deposits must have been broken deliberately, but deliberate breakage is difficult to distinguish from accidental breakage. This paper describes an experiment with fifteen handmade sherds without context information from the excavation in the terp of Ezinge (northern Netherlands). The sherds dated from between the 5th century BC and the 5th century AD. They were broken with the aid of various implements, similar to objects found during the excavation.Breaking the sherds demands considerable force. The usual
damage is a single, Y-shaped or, rarely, a more complex break with some damage at the point of impact. At the back, only breaks and rarely surface damage can be established. The use of an iron awl can be identified if the awl was placed obliquely on the surface. This position comes naturally if an awl was used to break a complete pot from above or from the inside. Exerting pressure, combined with a rotating movement, usually will cause a break. This method leaves characteristic indentations, which are regularly observed on the excavated pottery from Ezinge. The use of other implements leaves less clearly identifiable
traces of deliberate breakage.