LET'S CLAY! – Reviving Ancient Gestures Through Clay

What if we could rediscover one of the founding gestures of administration?

The Franco-German project LET’S CLAY! explores the ancient practice of sealing in the Ancient Near East, where the first urban societies invented systems of resource management and control using a humble yet powerful material: clay.

Bridging experimental archaeology, material sciences, and digital humanities, the project seeks to reconstruct the entire chaîne opératoire of sealing — from clay preparation and seal impression to the breaking and documentation of sealings.

An Innovative Approach – The Science of Ancient Gestures

Traditionally admired for their artistic beauty, seals are revisited in this project as functional and administrative tools. Our aim is to understand how they were used on clay, and the technical know-how behind their application: How was a jar sealed? What mistakes had to be avoided? What traces remain in clay on the backside, when a sealing was applied to a wooden box, a rolled up textile, or a basket? These are some of the questions that will guide our experiments.
Through experimental archaeology, we aim to better grasp how ancient societies organized, secured, and managed their resources. The results of these experiments will then be compared with archaeological sealings unearthed in the Near East, helping us to re-identify and reinterpret these often enigmatic objects. Researchers and students will experiment with different supports — clay, wood, reed, plaster, textiles — to rediscover the gestures, materials, and intentions behind sealing practices. Each step will be documented through photogrammetry, 3D modelling, and video recording, forming the basis of an open-access digital platform for scholars, museums, and curious audiences.

A Franco-German Scientific Adventure & A Training Ground for Young Researchers

LET’S CLAY! brings together the expertise of the CNRS and the Musée du Louvre (Paris), the Freie Universität Berlin and the Vorderasiatisches Museum (Berlin), and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities (Munich). This collaboration exemplifies the dynamic spirit of Franco-German research.
Museum collections from the Musée du Louvre and the Vorderasiatisches Museum, hosting sealings from key archaeological sites such as Fara, Uruk, Susa, and Tello, will provide the foundation for comparing experimental results with archaeological data.
Workshops will bring together graduate and doctoral students, early-career researchers, and senior scholars from diverse fields — archaeology, archaeometry, conservation, geology, ceramics, art history, and digital archaeology — fostering a multigenerational network of exchange.
Together, participants will share knowledge, methods, and experiences, laying the groundwork for future collaborative projects and long-term scientific partnerships between France and Germany.

A Project for Science – and for Everyone

Combining scientific rigor, creative experimentation, and open dissemination, LET’S CLAY! bridges ancient practices and modern research methods.
Its results — illustrated catalogues, 3D models, videos, and blog posts — will be made freely available online, inviting scholars, students, and enthusiasts to explore the administrative gestures that shaped the economic and religious life in the Ancient Near East.
Follow us on this scientific and human adventure — between France and Germany, between past gestures and present knowledge.

Project Timeline

• Experimental Workshop – Paris (Summer 2026): Reconstructing ancient sealing techniques
• International Conference – Munich (Summer 2027): Presenting results and fostering interdisciplinary dialogue
• Workshop – Berlin (Autumn 2027): Exploring sealing on architectural and immobile surfaces

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This project is funded by the UFA / Université Franco-Allemande.  

 Kontakt:

• Clélia Paladre, CNRS, UMR 7041, ArScAn-VEPMO ; Louvre museum, Research and Documentation Department, Department of Near Eastern Antiquities : clelia.paladre@louvre.fr
• Yvonne Helmholz, Freie Universität Berlin, Institut für Vorderasiatische Archäologie: y.helmholz@fu-berlin.de
• Albert Dietz, Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften & Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, KIŠIB-Projekt, Institut für Vorderasiatische Archäologie: Albert.Dietz@kishib.badw.de