Editing Petrography (section)

==Archaeological applications==
[[Archaeology|Archaeologists]] use petrography to identify mineral components in [[pottery]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Eiland |first=Murray |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1017581916 |title=Archaeological Sciences 1995 Proceedings of a Conference on the Application of Scientific Techniques to the Study of Archaeology. |date=1997 |publisher=Oxbow Books Ltd |others=Anthony Sinclair, Elizabeth Slater, John Gowlett |isbn=978-1-78570-806-0 |series=Oxbow Monograph 64 |location=Oxford |pages=69–76 |chapter=Petrography of Parthian Ceramics |oclc=1017581916}}</ref> This information ties the artifacts to geological areas where the raw materials for the pottery were obtained. In addition to clay, potters often used rock fragments, usually called "temper" or "aplastics", to modify the clay's properties. The geological information obtained from the pottery components provides insight into how potters selected and used local and non-local resources. Archaeologists are able to determine whether pottery found in a particular location was locally produced or traded from elsewhere. This kind of information, along with other evidence, can support conclusions about settlement patterns, group and [[individual mobility]], social contacts, and trade networks. In addition, an understanding of how certain minerals are altered at specific temperatures can allow archaeological petrographers to infer aspects of the [[ceramic]] production process itself, such as minimum and maximum temperatures reached during the original firing of the pot.