Melissa Chatfield
Ph.D. UC Santa Barbara, 2007
Melissa Chatfield is an archaeologist and post-doctoral researcher specializing in prehistoric pottery technology. Her doctoral research, completed at the University of California-Santa Barbara, used pottery style and technology to examine the introduction of closed (kiln) firing technologies during the Inca to Spanish Colonial transition in Cuzco, Peru. Her approach to studying pottery utilizing bulk chemistry, petrography, microstructure analysis, materials science, and replication studies explores the dynamic role of technology in state formation and culture contact.
In the Clay Technology Lab, located at the Stanford Archaeology Center, she continues her work addressing the development of pottery firing techniques (Chavín, Peru), adaptive clay formulations (Cuzco, Peru), and innovations in cooking practices (Çatalhöyük, Turkey) as seen through changes in performance characteristics of pots. Her work and collaborations examine the practical knowledge that emerges from the craftsperson-clay material relationship and how the interaction fuels creativity and innovation.
| 2010 | "Tracing Firing Technology through Clay Properties in Cuzco, Peru." Journal of Archaeological Science, doi:10.1016/j.jas.2009.11.003 (PDF) |
| 2009 | Pots, Brewers, and Hosts: Women’s Power and the Limits of Central Andean Feasting. In Drink, Power, and Society in the Andes, edited by Justin Jennings and Brenda Bowser, University Press of Florida. (with Justin Jennings). (PDF) |
| 2007 | From Inca to Spanish Colonial: Transitions in Ceramic Technology. Unpublished dissertation. University of California, Santa Barbara. (PDF) |
| 2005 | Monumental Architecture of Late Intermediate Period Cuzco: Continuities of Ritual Reciprocity and Statecraft between the Middle and Late Horizons. In Encuentros: Identidad, Poder y Manejo de Espacios Públicos, edited by Peter Kaulicke and Tom Dillehay. Boletín de Arqueología PUCP 9, pp. 257-280. Perú. (with Gordon F. McEwan and Arminda Gibaja O.) |
