ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a brief introduction to Korean Neolithic pottery and examines some of the recent work that has been done relating ceramic change to changes in the subsistence economy and residence mobility of hunter-gatherers in the Korean peninsula. It illustrates how, in Korean archaeology, the emergence, change and demise of early Korean pottery in a hunting-gathering context has generally been understood in association with subsistence strategy change. However, the presence of elaborate decoration on the majority of the hunter-gatherer ceramics, to which any functional role associated with economic activities is not easily attached, must also be noted. Indeed, the fact that these decorations disappear with the demise of a hunting-gathering lifestyle indicates that the making, decorating and use of the ceramics may have been an integral part of the social practices that facilitated the reproduction of a hunting-gathering way of life in the Korean Neolithic.
