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What were the signs for: ownership, potters' marks, counting, ritual, or something else?

Asked 31 Oct 2026 by ·0 answers·0·0 following
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About 95 per cent of well-recorded inscribed objects come from houses and their pits, and signs occur in every house examined, so the signs were part of domestic life rather than of a shrine or an administration⁠[1]. A quarter of signs sit on vessel bases, where potters' and owners' marks go; comb motifs that look like tallies make up about a sixth⁠[2]⁠[3]. Chapman reads the marks as household marks in an economy without record-keeping; Gimbutas read the same marks on figurines as sacred⁠[4]⁠[5].

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