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Adrien Delvoye
Adrien Delvoye
Research Associate
Sciences II, 4-426
+41 22 37 96971
E-mail
PRESENTATION
Archaeologist specialized in ceramology, my research focuses on West African societies during the Late Holocene. Familiar with funerary and megalithic contexts thanks to nearly 10 years of archaeological excavations at the UNESCO necropolis of Wanar (Senegal), my work interrogates the long-term evolution of ceramic production through the study of its typological and technological characteristics. Since 2019, my reflection has extended to modern and contemporary societies through an ethno-archaeological approach conducted in the central regions of Senegal and Gambia, and on-going collaboration on ressearch carried out in eastern Senegal.
My research also explores the forms and organization of settlements, ways of subsistence and ancient societies' material culture through different projects in West Africa, from the Sudano-Sahelian band (Senegal, The Gambia) to the tropical areas of the Gulf of Guinea (Benin) (see below). Ceramic production and other evidence of material culture, combined with the history of each of the regions studied, provide excellent supports for understanding the cultural dynamics of West African societies during the Medieval, Atlantic and modern periods, to the present day.
SENEGAL AND THE GAMBIA
Projet HOME : “HOusing in the Margins of Empires: Archaeology and Ethnohistory of settlements in the megalithic region of Senegal and The Gambia“ (2023-2027).
(FNS Ambizione PZ00P1_216186 ; Applicant: Adrien Delvoye)
The project HOME (2023-2027) aims to gather the first reference archaeological and ethnohistorical data on inhabitation and domestic sites in the central regions of Senegal and The Gambia, in a region that has been studied essentially studied for its megalithic funerary sites erected at the turn of the 1st and 2nd millennia CE. Despite some data collected over the last few decades, the study of ancient populations' lifestyles remains very incomplete in Senegambia. Aspects as central as the nature of habitats (forms, materials, construction techniques), modes of subsistence (plant and animal resources) and the material culture of these societies are still largely unknown.
Our objective is to examine these different topics through an interdisciplinary approach, at the crossroads of the Humanities and social sciences (archaeology, history) and the natural sciences (archaeobotany, archaeozoology, geoarchaeology, geomorphology, ceramic petrography). It comprises an archaeological component (pedestrian surveys, test trenches, extensive excavations) enabling the acquisition of new data on ancient Senegambian societies, as well as an ethnohistorical component (Arab and European written sources, photographic archives, ethnographic sources) providing the basis for reconstructing long-term cultural dynamics.
Project "Pottery of yesterday and today: transmission of technical know-how and evolution of ceramic functions between Senegal and Gambia in the 1st and 2nd millennia AD" (2019-2022).
(funded by the Fyssen Fundation)
Pottery is a privileged material for an anthropology of techniques and ethnoarchaeology, and is still an active craft in many parts of Africa such as Senegal and The Gambia. In these two countries, pottery is also an essential chronological marker for megalithic funerary sites (8th - 16th c. AD) and a precious witness to ancient know-how. However, from past to contemporary societies, our knowledge of domestic pottery production in this region remains very scarce.
This post-doctoral research aimed to fill this gap by exploring the diversity of current ceramic traditions in the central regions of Senegal and The Gambia, through surveys of potters from different communities (Wolof, Malinke, Sarakole). Related to the socio-economic contexts of production, this opening to ethnography interrogates how knowledge are transmitted, the variability of manufacturing processes, the modes of consumption and relationship between techniques and identities.
Between archaeology and ethnography, this work illustrates how data relating to ancient and current material cultures can lead to historical and anthropological interpretations. Thanks to the concept of chaîne opératoire, the study of a craft such as pottery becomes a privileged vector of information for describing the evolution of societies. For the first time in the region, a correlation can be established between the distribution of certain technical traits and the influence of ancient kingdoms, sometimes dating back to the 13th century. In central Senegal and The Gambia, current ceramic traditions differ mainly in the roughing out techniques employed: fist flattening on the one hand, and molding on convex forms on the other. It's worth noting that these two technical traditions belong to distinct geographical and cultural areas, separated by the Gambia River. The former is linked to a now predominantly Wolof area on the right bank of the river, while the latter is only attested among Malinke and Sarakole communities on its left bank. This delimitation also coincides with the northern limits of the Kingdom of Gabou to the south and, to the north, with the southern borders of Grand Djolof and the small kingdoms that resulted from its political dislocation. This is a decisive step, shedding new light on cultural dynamics in Senegambia during the 1st and 2nd millennia AD.
These cultural dynamics can also be observed in more recent periods, on the scale of just a few generations. On the right bank of the Gambia River, major socio-economic changes that occured between the late 19th and 20th centuries had a direct impact on production and consumption patterns. Through these mutations, this research finally contributes to interrogate the dynamism of ceramic traditions often described as "declining" or "disappearing", and to question the processes at the origin of such phenomena, and describe their rhythms. Specific material evidence could bear witness to such dynamics and be identified in an archaeological context.
Collaboration to the Project Falémé – Ethnoarchaeology of pottery traditions in eastern Senegal
Between 2012 and 2015, Anne Mayor (University of Geneva) and Ndèye Sokhna Guèye (IFAN-UCAD) carried out four ethnographic surveys on pottery traditions from the Falémé Valley in eastern Senegal, as part of the research program "Human population and palaeoenvironment in Africa - project Falémé". Data from these surveys were fully processed and synthesized in direct collaboration with A. Mayor.
Despite its important cultural diversity, the Falémé valley offers a case of great technical homogeneity regarding pottery traditions, reflected in the sharing of a single roughing out technique throughout the area: the molding on a convex form. The aim of this research is therefore to question this apparent technical homogeneity, and to identify which level(s) of the manufacturing process is more likely to express artisans' identity. A particular attention is paid to the most recent transformations in pottery practices, with, for example, significant replacement of tools or tempers. This work is also an opportunity to question the factors (environmental, cultural, socio-economic) behind these technical variability or homogeneity. One of this study' key findings is that technical identity of artisans is rather expressed by firing and post-firing procedures than by roughing out methods. The spatial distibution of these specific technical traits coincides with the extent of ancient medieval regional kingdoms. These investigations have been the subject of several presentations in international conferences and of a publication on archaeometric data (Cantin and Mayor 2018 Journal of Archaeological Science). A new paper will shortly be published in the Journal of Anthropological Archaeology (Delvoye et al. 2024).
BENIN
Collaboration to the PROJECT AFRICA – ARCHÉOMÉTALLURGIE DU FER : RESSOURCES, IDENTITÉS ET COMMERCE EN AFRIQUE (DIR. C. ROBION BRUNER, CNRS - FRANCE)
Initiated in 2023, my participation to the project AFRICA is rooted in my desire to broaden my understanding of pottery traditions and settlement patterns to West African societies. This Franco-Benino-Togolese archaeological project focusing on the importance of iron in medieval and modern West African societies also seeks to document where and how ancient blacksmiths lived. One of the project's study areas is in the department of Couffo, in south-west Benin, where intensive surveys carried out since 2021 have revealed the presence of very large mounds of metallurgical waste, as well as production units (Kpeta 1 and Dolomey). Besides, a large anthropogenic mound called Kpeta 2 has been identified just 200m from the Kpeta 1 metallurgical site. Its surface is covered with numerous ceramic and lithic remains (millstones and stone grinders fragments). In 2021, a test pit confirmed the presence of ceramic pavements covering a burial structure. Radiocarbon dating on charcoals allowed to date these remains between the early 14th and 17th centuries. This period is particularly strategic for West African societies as it corresponds to the arrival of the first European navigators at the end of the 15th century, marking the start of the so-called "Atlantic" period.
I'm a scientific collaborator of the AFRICA project both as a ceramologist and as a field archaeologist. Since August 2023, I've been in charge of the excavation of the Kpeta 2 settlement site and of studying ceramic material resulting from research carried out in this region, for which a typo-chronological framework has yet to be established.