The first thing that a reviewer may look for in the introduction of an edited volume such as this handbook would be an indication of who the intended audience might be: for whom was this book conceived? Who were the editor and publishers hoping would read this volume? I went to the ‘Introduction’ to see what the editor, Alice Hunt, had in mind and came away with no idea, which was disconcerting. Instead, both the ‘Introduction’ and the inside dust jacket panel support each other with the statement that the book ‘draws together topics and methodologies essential for the socio-cultural, mineralogical, and geochemical analysis of archaeological ceramic’, but no mention of a prospective readership. This is literally the key to this volume; the majority is about the scientific analysis of ceramic material and in particular the extraordinary array of techniques which can be applied to ceramics to learn about provenance, production, function, use, and date. The minority is centred around themes such as the cultural dimensions behind the decision making process of potmaking, the evolution of approaches to understanding the organisation of pottery production, and the interpretative perspective which is now encompassing a more holistic approach to formal analysis and typological classification of archaeological pottery, one which emphasizes the social worlds that these pots were made within and reflect.

There are thirty-six chapters in this volume organized into seven parts: Part One, ‘Introduction’ (two chapters); Part Two, ‘Research Design and Data Analysis’ (four); Part Three, ‘Foundational Concepts’ (eight); Part Four, ‘Evaluating Ceramic Provenance’ (eleven); Part Five, ‘Investigating Ceramic Manufacture’ (six); Part Six, ‘Assessing Vessel Function’ (three); Part Seven, ‘Dating Ceramic Assemblages’ (two).

Chapter 2 (‘History of Scientific Research’), by Tite, reminds us that ceramic research should be holistic by engaging both archaeologists and archaeological scientists, but reveals that we are going to be presented with a focus on archeometric techniques and this is what the volume does in spades. If you are interested in learning about what petrography or optical microscopy is and how it has been used to study the provenance of ceramics or similarly about isotope analysis, electron microprobe analysis, micropalaeontology, x-ray powder diffraction (XRPD), x-ray fluorescence-energy dispersive (ED-XRF) and wavelength dispersive (WD-XRF) spectrometry, what a useful device a handheld portable energy-dispersive x-ray fluorescence spectrometer might be, or how particle-induced x-ray emission (PIXE) analysis has applications suitable for investigating ceramics, as do both inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and laser ablation inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS), instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA), and synchrotron radiation, then go straight to Part Four which is devoted to evaluating ceramic provenance. This volume is a go-to resource for any researcher wanting to know which method of scientific analysis or combination of methods may be able to help them find the clues in their fabrics to answer their questions about where their pots had been made. This is an excellent section for third-year or masters students taking a module on scientific analysis of ceramics as each chapter has been written by one or more international specialists in the subject who provide not only an explanation of what each method is capable of achieving and how that is achieved, but also present an archaeological case study of its use and an extensive bibliography to peruse for further information in most cases. Part Five is similar in this respect with its focus on the nature of ceramic manufacture and what techniques are now available for revealing the physical production of ceramics, such as the amazing insights provided by affordable x-radiography of vessels and sherds revealing strong and subtle variations in manufacturing methods; what the possibilities, results, and challenges are when using Raman spectroscopy; and when Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) might be suitable, for example.

To balance these two parts, which emphasize mineralogical and geochemical analyses in particular, this volume is extremely fortunate to be the host for three outstanding contributions, all in Part Three, amongst others which focus on socio-cultural analyses specifically. These three chapters embody what the purpose of archaeological ceramic analysis should be—using pottery to learn about ancient societies; examining ceramics by using the application of theoretical concepts linked to suitable analytical methods to learn about the people who made pots, the people who sold pots, and the people who used pots. In just ten pages of text, Roux (Ch. 8, ‘Ceramic Manufacture: The Chaîne Opératoire Approach’) reviews the history and practice of the chaîne opèratoire (operational sequence) method of analysis and shows us how potters’ actions, visible in the fabrics and on the surfaces of their vessels, reveal their decision-making stages during the manufacturing process and what this says about the social worlds within which they lived and practiced their craft. Because there is a strong correlation between technological procedures of object-making and the social groups who made them, artefacts in archaeological assemblages can be used as a means for investigating socioeconomic issues such as production, distribution, and the trading of goods, as well as the historical dynamics of innovation and the changes observed in the traditions and technologies of these groups through time. Roux makes a coherent argument that it is possible to not only identify technical traditions and manufacturing systems through the chaîne opèratoire method but also ‘patterns of cultural descent through the transmission of technical gestures’ (p.110) by focusing future research not just on characterization but by using this empirical evidence in an evolutionary perspective to explore the actual conditions of change.

A slightly longer contribution by Duistermaat (Ch. 9, ‘The Organization of Pottery Production: Towards a Relational Approach’) is equally emphatic in that research into the organization of pottery production should take on-board the best range of analytical perspectives and methods that have proved useful in recent decades and combine them through using the concept of tracing entanglements between human and non-human agents as the key to a new relational approach which can produce a narrative network of coherent sequences that is greater than the individual actions and which can be assessed through network analysis. Albero Santacreu and colleagues (Ch. 12, ‘Formal Analysis and Typological Classification in the Study of Ancient Pottery’) address the phenomenon of formal typology, a foundational concept in archaeological ceramic analysis. Typology should not be viewed as simply a straightjacket for structuring the variation in shape found in an assemblage but rather a collection of frameworks which each can reveal different aspects about assemblages. As opposed to rejecting subjective pottery typology and form studies in favour of archaeometric analyses, for example, the emphasis is on inclusivity of different approaches as significantly more informative of ceramic assemblages. This is emphasized by an awareness of various approaches as levels of investigation commencing with form-based analysis and classification strategies to discovering the application of interpretative tools required to elucidate the experiences and meaning-making activities of past societies through the examination of their objects and, in particular, culminating in new ways of using pottery typologies as the means for revealing the dynamics of social groups. Different typologies focusing on functionality, textual metaphor, identity, and, most recently, technology have provided new perspectives and thus new interpretative possibilities. All three of these contributions in Part Three are clearly aimed at pushing the boundaries of archaeological ceramic research.

In addition, there are more practical contributions in this Handbook which are designed to specifically help us all improve our standards of recording and presenting information about our assemblages and why this is necessary. For example, do you know how to define and write a fabric, or paste, description that is actually meaningful to other researchers in what it says? What you may think is suitable for a report on the nature of your assemblage could actually be uninformative to others. There are standards which are helpful in making sure that we communicate what we see in ceramic fabrics in a systematic style that is both objective (scientific) and subjective (socio-cultural) in range. Recognising that there is a major link between the range of colour possible in any specific clay based on the firing temperature used to harden it to make ceramic material (Whitbread, Ch. 13) is developed into colourful case studies by Daszkiewicz and Maritan (Ch. 27) using experimental firings to discover the effects which different temperatures have on the microstructures of fabrics and how the controlled re-firing of actual potsherds can inversely reveal the original firing temperature of vessels (plates 5‒8). A new, analytical method of illustrating archaeological potsherds is presented which combines the traditional hand-drawn profile of sections, shaded drawings, and (presumably in colour?) modern photographic techniques of sherds that together facilitate comparative technical study of an assemblage. You can see how this works using Photoshop in Shirvalkar's contribution (Ch. 14) if you are unfamiliar with the method.

In contrast, the chapters in Part Two appear to be written for use by experienced researchers in archaeological science. They require the reader to have significant research experience and quantities of archaeometric data at hand in order to be able to appreciate their scope and contribution fully. Their position within the Handbook suggests that they are the first stage a researcher should explore after the ‘Introduction’ and the ‘History of Scientific Research’ (Chs 1‒2), but I would suggest that this part might have been more appropriately placed at the end of the volume as a critique of research design and a cautionary warning to consider evaluating data and methods. Worryingly in the research design discussion, there is an unusual concept ‘that higher complexity in ceramics manufacture implies higher social complexity’ (Buxeda i Garrigós & Madrid i Fernández, Ch. 3, p. 22), which the editor may have considered replacing with ‘greater degree of complexity’ as a more appropriate phrase, particularly as this is what is indicated in the associated but over-reduced figure to which it refers.

The production of this volume is less than what might have been expected from Oxford University Press. The typeface could be uncomfortable for anyone over forty. This may be a product of the size, font, and thickness or density of the type, as well as width of the page to track across. Several of the figures containing bar charts, diagrams, and graphs (figs 3.1, 3.3a‒b, 9.2, and 10.2) have been over-reduced to the point of being a challenge in this hardback format. At least one photo (fig. 7.2) needs to be in colour to reveal why it was included in the volume. Clearly, there was a significantly limited budget for the production of this volume; the few high quality colour plates present have been positioned together in the centre of the book and in so doing sliced one contribution (Ch. 20), which has no references to colour plates in its text, in half. To make matters even more awkward, there is no list of colour plates as there are for figures and tables and the plate numbers found in the captions of each colour image do not reference the chapter to which they belong in every case; only one in nine plates has this information. As a result, there is no way to easily connect a plate to its reference location in the text. So, to improve this situation, plate 1 is referenced in Ch. 7, ‘Ceramic Raw Material’, plate 2 in Ch. 11, ‘Mineralogical and Chemical Alteration’, plate 3 can be found in Ch. 13 (see above), plate 4 belongs with Ch. 15, ‘Petrography; Optical Microscopy’, and plates 5‒9 to Ch. 27 (see above). Presumably these production weaknesses will be improved for the sake of prospective readers with the eBook edition of the Handbook?

To summarize, this is a useful compendium of archaeometric methods and applications which have been developed and tested over decades and new ones you may not be aware of that are now available for characterizing the inclusions and clay sources, assessing manufacturing techniques, glazes, and vessel function, and determining the date of archaeological ceramics written by international researchers in specific fields of expertise but without any mention of an application to design analysis to explore social networks and identities (for example, c.f. Cruells et al., Reference Cruells, Mateiuciucová and Nieuwenhuyse2017). These contributions provide a single resource where it is possible to discover which method(s) may best suit research requirements or provide students with up-to-date and well-referenced explanations of a wide-range of archaeometric approaches. In addition, there is a significant but smaller number of contributions which inspire a more holistic and interpretative approach to the study of archaeological ceramics aiming to discover the nature of the social groups who made and used these objects through their investigation as proxies for people. Artefacts are socio-cultural histories of once living communities which can provide a means for us to learn about how they conducted their lives making the choices and responses they did in order to flourish or unfortunately to fail. Fifteen years ago in his insightful book, Archaeological Theory and Scientific Practice, Andrew M. Jones (Reference Jones2002) told us why we needed to merge archaeology's age-old division of science on one side and interpretative or humanist theory on the other to make a better informed archaeology for the future and how this might be achieved. He demonstrated that the success of archaeology depended upon the merging of scientific and cultural studies of objects, such as pottery, to move the discipline forward. This Handbook has many contributions which can help to reach such a possibility.