Pottery Typology in Certain Lesser Antilles

Abstract Pottery types are demonstrably useful archaeological tools in the Lesser Antilles. The sequence of types established in selected excavations in St. Lucia and in Martinique confirms the sequence in Trinidad and northern South America. Several horizon markers are uniform in their distribution from St. Lucia to Guadeloupe. These are the early “types,” such as White-on-Red, Broad-Line Incised, Incised Polychrome, and Zoned Crosshatch. An additional type may be delineated based on conventionalized faces with coffee-bean eyes. A later type shows rim treatment wherein the lip area is regularly punctated with finger depressions. The seriation of these uniform and easily recognized types enables the reconstruction of a site-occupation sequence applicable to much of the Lesser Antilles.