I think the most fascinating, and also frustrating, thing about archaeology is how little we actually know.
We find these tiny fragments, and they tell us something about the past, but every artefact invites a lot more questions than it provides answers.
My late father spent some time researching tattoos and body marks in antiquity. A common pattern that appeared often were 4 dots arranged like the vertices of a rhombus. The pattern appears eg. on terracotta figurines and must have had some significance. But we have no idea what it meant, and all we can do is make wild guesses.
We find these tiny fragments, and they tell us something about the past, but every artefact invites a lot more questions than it provides answers.
My late father spent some time researching tattoos and body marks in antiquity. A common pattern that appeared often were 4 dots arranged like the vertices of a rhombus. The pattern appears eg. on terracotta figurines and must have had some significance. But we have no idea what it meant, and all we can do is make wild guesses.