Claire Padovani

Wainwright Fellow
Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies
claire.padovani@ames.ox.ac.uk
Claire Padovani

Biography 

I am a field archaeologist specialising in pottery pyrotechnology and the organisation of craft production in protohistoric Southwest Asia. I am currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oxford (2026–2027), following a postdoctoral fellowship at CNRS Archéorient in Lyon (2024–2025), and a PhD at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University (2019–2023). 
 
Since 2017, I have conducted archaeological fieldwork across Southwest Asia, mainly in Iraq, as part of several international research projects and expeditions. I currently direct the CraftLand project, which investigates the long-term exploitation of a clay-rich environment in the Chamchamal region of Iraqi Kurdistan. 
 
Focusing on firing practices, the spatial organisation of pottery workshops, and their integration within their socio-ecological environments, my research examines transformations in production economies from the Early Chalcolithic (7th millennium BCE) to the Bronze Age (3rd millennium BCE), a period marked by the emergence of the first cities and states. I mobilise archaeological evidence, experimentation, concepts of industrial ecology and interdisciplinary collaborations to challenge models that assume a progressive co-evolution of social, technological, and organisational dimensions within a linear process of production intensification. In doing so, I critically reassess the concepts and definitions of “modes of production” commonly used to characterise ancient societies. 

Educational Background

I began my academic training with a Bachelor’s degree in Archaeology at Aix-Marseille University, followed by a Master’s degree at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University. I completed a PhD in Archaeology, Ethnology and Prehistory at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, under the supervision of Prof. Pascal Butterlin. My doctoral thesis is entitled “The Organisation of Ceramic Production in the First Urban Societies: Technical and Social Analysis of Pyrotechnologies and Pottery Workshops in Southwest Asia (4th–3rd Millennium BCE)”. 

Research Interests 

  • Archaeology of South-West Asia (7th–3rd millennia BCE) 
  • Ceramic pyrotechnology 
  • Organisation of labour and the ecology of ceramic production 
  • Digital humanities in archaeology (spatial analysis, network analysis) 
  • Experimentation 

Current Projects 

Project Leadership 
  • Science with the senses: formalising sensory experience in experimental pyro-archaeology (2026-2028). Funding: IXXI, Institute of Complex System, Maison des Sciences de l’Homme Lyon St-Etienne. This project explores the relationship between sensory perceptions and instrumental measurements in experimental pyroarchaeology, applied to the study of protohistoric pottery kilns in Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq). Through a process of co-creation between an artist-designer and an archaeologist, it seeks to develop a hybrid vocabulary that is both sensory and analytical. 
  • Powering the State. Pyrotechnology and the Landscapes of Pottery Production in Early Urban Southwest Asia (2026-2027). Funding: G. A. Wainwright fellowship. The project aims to re-situate ceramic production within its micro-regional context through a more nuanced and integrative approach. To this end, it adopts the framework of industrial ecology, a functional and energetic approach, analysing production at the territorial scale – which is particularly relevant for the study of Mesopotamian pottery manufacture – through the flows and transformations of materials and energy between natural and social systems. 
  • POP_Voc - Pottery Pyrotechnology and Craft Spaces Vocabulary (2026). Funding: Advancing Frontier Research in the Arts and Humanities (European Union). The aim of this project was the creation of a curated list of terms (with their definitions and relations) dedicated to the description of pottery firing technologies and craft-related spaces in a diachronic and transregional perspective, to support consistent documentation, analysis, and data sharing in archaeological and ceramic studies. 
  • Crafting Landscape (2025-present). Funding: ASOR, CNRS Archéorient, Ashur Brick, etc. This fieldwork project aims to investigate the strategies of natural resources exploitation and organisation of pottery manufacture, in relation to other economic productions, in a clay-rich environment in the Chamchamal region, Iraqi Kurdistan. It carries out geological, archaeological and ethnological surveys.  
  • The Kiln DataBase (KDB) Project (2020-present). Funding: European Cooperation in Science and Technology. The KDB Project develops a digital model for recording and analysing pottery kilns and their archaeological workshop contexts across the ancient Near East. It brings together scattered excavation data in a structured, accessible database designed to support comparative, spatial, and diachronic studies of ceramic production. https://heurist.huma-num.fr/kiln_mesopotamia/web/304 

Research Centres & Projects

  • Pyroarchaeology Commission (1F) of the International Union of Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences (2026-present) 
  • Qurayyah Joint Archaeological Project (2026-present), directed by M. Luciani (University of Vienna) 
  • International Association for Assyriology (2025-present) 
  • Early Urbanisation’s Roots, Unfolding and Kick-off (E.URUK) Project (2024-present), directed by J.S. Baldi (CNRS Archéorient) and M. Zingarello (CNRS CEPAM) 
  • British Association for Near Eastern Archaeology (2024-present) 
  • American Society of Overseas Research (2023-present) 
  • Cognitive Research in Archaeology of Fossil Techniques Project (2022-2024), directed by J.S. Baldi (CNRS Archéorient) 
  • Archaeological Expedition in the Erbil Plain (2022-present), directed by L. Peyronel (University of Milan – La Statale) 
  • French Archaeological Mission in the Qara Dagh (2020-present), directed by J.S. Baldi (CNRS Lyon) 
  • Argiles Project (2019-present), directed by S. Vilain and B. Chiti (CNRS Arscan) 
  • Mission Larsa - Oueili (2019-present), directed by R. Vallet (CNRS Temps) 
  • Mission Qara Dagh (2018-2019), directed by R. Vallet (CNRS Temps) 

Recent publications

Peer-reviewed journal articles 
 
  • Padovani, C., F. Lefèvre, M. Kabemba Yangie, M. Clausse, J.S. Baldi. Under review. Energy Efficiency and Temporality in Early Urban Pottery Production: Modelling Heat Transfer in Connected Pottery Firing Structures  (4th–3rd millennium BCE, Southwest Asia). Journal of Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences. DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-9882432/v1 
  • Padovani, C. 2025. Beyond Ceramic Product: Large-scale Pottery Production and the Construction of Labour Networks in Mesopotamia (4th-3rd millennium BCE). Paléorient, 51, 99-118. DOI: 10.4000/15apm 
  • Padovani, C., Zingarello, M. 2025. An Emerging Proto-Industrial Paradigm: Recent Data on the Organisation of Ceramic Production in Ur III Mesopotamia. Enki & Ptah, 1, 101-121. DOI: 10.54103/eap/27311 
  • Padovani, C. 2025. Kiln Database (KDB) Project. Creating Knowledge on Ancient Southwest Asia Pottery Firing Technology: Theoretical and Methodological Problems. Archaeologi e Calcolatori, 36, 1, 9-28. DOI: 10.19282/ac.36.1.2025.01 
  • Padovani, C. 2025. Le four Hoffmann à foyer continu (XIXe-XXe siècles): Une technique de cuisson non-mécanisée à l’ère industrielle. e-Phaïstos, XIII-1.DOI: 10.4000/13vlt 
  • Padovani, C., Flahaut, J., Willems, S. 2025. Introduction to Exploring Craft Spaces: A New Insight into the Archaeology of Pottery Production. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 64. DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2025.105183 
  • Padovani, C. 2024d. Revisiting Kilns Typologies to Reconstruct Firing Traditions Transformations. A Comparative Analysis of Halaf and Ubaid Kilns in Context. Paléorient, 50, 1, 125-142. DOI: 10.4000/12ugw 
  • Padovani, C. 2024c. The Organisation of Pottery Production in the First Urban Societies. Technical and Social Analysis of Pyrotechnologies and Potters’ Working Spaces in Southwest Asia (4th and 3rd millennium BCE). e-Phaïstos, XII-2.  DOI: 10.4000/12rzk 
  • Padovani, C. 2023c. Kilns and Potters: Measuring Pyrotechnology Diversity to Assess Dynamics of Firing Techniques Diffusion within Southwest Asia Communities, 6500-4700 BCE. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 52.  DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2023.104273 
  • Padovani, C. 2021. Expérimenter le fonctionnement d’un four de potier : Une question de forme. Le bulletin de l’APERA, 1, 113-121.DOI:10.58079/ba11 
  • Vallet, R., Baldi, J. S., Padovani, C., Abd-el-Kadim, R., Douché, C. 2020. « Preliminary Report on the VIIIth And IXth Campaigns at Tell el-‘Uwaili. Sumer, LXVI, 11-39.  
  • Vallet, R., Baldi, J. S., Sauvage, M., Naccaro, H., Zingarello, M., Bridey, F., Paladre,  
  • C., Padovani, C., Rahoof, K., Qader, H., Rashid, K. 2019. Cultural Identities and Territorial Polities Emergence in the longue durée: A View from the Zagros Piedmont. Paléorient, 45, 163-189. DOI: 10.4000/paleorient.751 
Special Issues 
 
  • Baldi J.S, Padovani, C. in preparation. Scaling up! Setting Conditions and Structuring of Large-Scale Pottery Workshop in a Transregional and Diachronic Perspective. Oxford Journal of Archaeology.  - This special issue has been approved by the editorial board and is in preparation. 
  • Padovani, C., Flahaut, J., Willems, S. 2023. Exploring Craft Spaces: A New Insight into the Archaeology of Pottery Production. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports. - This special issue contains 1 editorial and 10 research articles. 

Book chapters and conference proceedings 

  • Padovani, C. accepted. Mégamachines ou artisans du feu ? Critique archéologique du « mythe de la machine », à travers l’étude des fours de potiers dans l’industrie céramique protohistorique en Mésopotamie. In: L. Anderson, G. Glasson Deschaumes, E. Grimaud, N. Guimbretière, J. Schuh (eds.), Technocritique(s). Presses universitaires Paris Nanterre, Nanterre. 
  • Padovani, C. 2025. Kiln Connections: Pyrotechnological Innovations in the Ceramic Industry of Southwest Asia during the 4th and 3rd Millennium BCE. In: S. D. Haddow, C. Mazzucato, I. Thuesen (dir.), Proceedings of the 13th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden. 295-307. DOI: 10.13173/9783447123426 
  • Padovani, C. 2024b. La morphologie des espaces de travail potiers : un indice de l’organisation sociale du travail dans les sociétés de la fin du néolithique et du chalcolithique en Asie du Sud-Ouest (6500-4000 av. n. è.). In:  C. Cheval, O. Langlois, M. Lauwers, G. Palumbi, H. Procopiou (dir), ACTEURS TECHNIQUES, ACTEURS SOCIAUX, des vestiges matériels à l’organisation sociale du travail, de la Préhistoire à nos jours. CEPAM, Nice. 147-157. DOI: 10.4000/14yte 
  • Padovani, C. 2024a. The Hill on Fire: Strategies of Ceramic Production at Logardan during the Second Half of the Third Millennium BCE. In: B. Couturaud (dir.), Early Bronze Age in Iraqi Kudistan. Presses de l’IFPO, Beyrouth. 313-328.  ISBN : 978-2-35159-795-8 
  • Padovani, C. 2023b. Construire un four : de la fouille des ateliers de Logardan (Kurdistan irakien) à l’expérimentation. In: X. Faivre (dir.), Argiles  De la physique du matériau  à l’expérimentation Actes des journées d’études du Programme Collectif « Argiles » (2018-2020).  Unité mixte de recherche Archéologies et sciences de l’Antiquité  (UMR 7041 – ArScAn, Nanterre). Archaeopress, Oxford. 334-346.  DOI: 10.32028/9781789694208  
  • Padovani, C. 2023a. Kiln Technology and Potters’ Agency in the Early Bronze Age: The Social Construct of Logardan Firing Areas, Western Qara Dagh. In: N. Marchetti, M. Campeggi, F. Cavaliere, C. D’Orazio, G. Giacosa, E. Mariani (dir.), Proceedings of the 12th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East. 6th- 9th April 2021, Bologna. Vol. 1: Field Reports. Environmental Archaeology. Hammering the Material World. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden. 475-490.  DOI: 10.13173/9783447118736 
Scientific blog articles 
 
  • Zingarello, M., Baldi, J.S., Padovani, C. 2026. Rejibah (Southern Irak): : A city at the dawn of Mesopotamian urbanisation, ArchéOrient - Le Blog, 27 mars 2026. https://doi.org/10.58079/15yfk 
  • Baldi, J. S., Padovani, C., Zingarello, M. 2024. FArMQaD Back in the Field at Logardan, ArchéOrient - Le Blog, 11 octobre 2024. https://doi.org/10.58079/12gfq 
  • Padovani, C., Flahaut, J., Willems, S. 2024. Archéologie de la production céramique et des espaces artisanaux : Regards croisés, ArchéOrient - Le Blog, 17 mai 2024.   https://doi.org/10.58079/11okx 
  • Padovani, C., Baldi, J. S., Zingarello, M. 2023. La perception du feu et de son travail : un compte rendu sensoriel de cuissons expérimentales de poteries à Jalès, ArchéOrient - Le Blog, 20 janvier 2023.  https://doi.org/10.58079/bd2o 

Links

ORCID Profil: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5983-9191 

Academia Profil: https://oxford.academia.edu/ClairePadovani 

CNRS Archéorient Profil: https://www.archeorient.mom.fr/annuaire/padovani-claire