The Godin IV-III transition in central western Iran, during the second quarter of the third millennium B.C., permits investigation of the relationship between ceramic and socio-cultural change. The marked dissimilarity of the two assemblages, grey-black versus painted buff ware, might seem to suggest a major cultural break. Examination of regional ceramic distributions and continuity of occupation and settlement patterns, however, suggest underlying socio-cultural continuity from one period to the next. Technological and typological analyses demonstrate continuity of numerous ceramic attributes. Following the adoption of grey-black ware into the Godin III buff ware assemblage as a minor household-made component, workshop potters made a succession of technological adaptations in order to integrate it into the workshop production of the buff ware assemblage, with increasing use of vessel production techniques characteristic of the latter. Socio-economic factors, rather than migration and population replacement, underlie the change between these two pottery assemblages.