Early pottery in Amazonia provides important clues to the activities of its makers: from around 2000 BC vats indicate the brewing of sweet manioc (cassava) beer, while around 1000 BC griddles show bitter manioc was being baked into bread.
Shell middens (rubbish heaps) from Guyana to the mouth of the Amazon and on the lower reaches of the Amazon and Orinoco rivers have recently revealed pottery dated as early as 4000 BC or possibly even 5000 BC; by 2000 BC most areas of the Amazon basin made shell-tempered pottery decorated with geometric designs infilled using a number of decorative techniques such as incision and painting.
A new style of sand-tempered pottery emerged around 1000 BC. It was often decorated by applying small modelled elements (called 'adornos'), a technique which reached great heights of elaboration after AD 500.
Several different major pottery styles were current and were distributed over vast areas, giving a clue to the widespread connections that were possible by canoe along the river valleys and streams of Amazonia.
After about AD 1 polychrome (many-coloured) pottery became widely popular though plain wares also continued. As well as pots for food preparation, pottery was used to make figurines, pubic covers and burial urns, some of them very elaborate.