Incised earthenware “Sa Huynh-Kalanay” bowl. 500 BC–AD 200. Cave 14, Leyte, Philippines. Asian Archaeology, UMMA Philippine Expedition. UMMAA 34140.

Carl E. Guthe, the Museum’s first director, excavated in the southern Philippines from 1922 to 1925. As a result of these excavations, the Museum received a large collection of 14th–17th century Chinese and Southeast Asian trade ceramics. However, many of the sites Guthe excavated had a much longer history. The ceramic bowl shown here, which is from a burial cave on the island of Leyte, is part of a widespread ceramic tradition that dates between 500 BC and AD 200. Based on his analysis of Guthe’s Philippine collections and his own fieldwork, archaeologist Wilhem G. Solheim called this class of ceramics the “Sa Huynh-Kalanay” type, after a site in Vietnam. Sa Huynh-Kalanay-related ceramics have also been found in Thailand, Cambodia, and Indonesia. French archaeologist Aude Favreau has researched these materials in order to examine the nature and extent of the social, political, and technological networks through which ceramic vessels and stylistic traditions were adopted across the extensive South China Sea region.

Back to Day 121 or continue to Day 123.

In honor of the University of Michigan’s 2017 bicentennial, we are celebrating the remarkable archaeological and ethnographic collections and rich legacy of research and teaching at the Museum of Anthropological Archaeology by posting one entry a day for 200 days. The entries will highlight objects from the collections, museum personalities, and UMMAA expeditions. The Kelsey Museum of Archaeology is also posting each day for 200 days on Twitter and Facebook (follow along at #KMA200). After the last post, an exhibition on two centuries of archaeology at U-M opens at the Kelsey. Visit the exhibit—a joint project of the UMMAA and the Kelsey—from October 18, 2017 to May 27, 2018.