Coarse wares from western Cyrenaica and southern Crete are similar in shape and workmanship and are not distinguished petrologically. It has been possible to identify three distinct groups by neutron activation analysis: (i) Keratokambos (Crete); (ii) Benghazi lime-rich ware; (iii) Benghazi shell-rich ware. The element ratios for (ii) and (iii) are 1.52 106 0.16 (excluding sodium) which suggests a dilution of clay from the same source by shell for example in the shellrich ware. The element ratio for sodium is only 1.01 and the sodium concentration increases linearly with time. This could be sodium absorption with time from the brackish water for which the region is renowned.