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There seems to be some evidence that this was done in the Bronze age along the west coast of Scotland anyway. [url=http://www.scotsman.com/news/scottish-news/top-stories/archaeologists-in-oban-discover-bronze-age-was-height-of-cool-1-2335347]Link to the Scotsman article[/url].

Funny you mention it, Guthrum and I were just discussing that very thing last night! I had suggested digging a pit and lining it with a tarp to put the coolers in so the ice lasts longer since at Pennsic the ice was melting at a phenomenal rate, short of acquiring a propane fridge, I was trying to think of any way to keep them cooler.

Very interesting! Now that I know about these clay vessels I'll be certain to keep my eyes out for similar ones at Celtic digs. Since the main functionality of these is the evaporation through the unglazed container, it's entirely possible Celtic pottery also had this feature.

Perhaps in conjunction with these vessels simply digging a hole or mini "root cellar" on site could assist with cooling. Just a few feet down can give temps as low as 58-60 deg F. While not the chilly 52 deg F temps that true caves have, every little bit helps.

After returning from Pennsic, I spent a little time looking into alternate methods for cooling.Norseland acquired a propane refrigerator with their recent used trailer purchase, but I was more interested in ideas that would both reduce the amount of ice required as well as be as period as possible.One elegant solution is the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pot-in-pot_refrigerator]Zeer pot[/url] (a pot inside a pot that cools through evaporative cooling). The technology appears to be quite ancient (Egypt) though it has recently been revived in Africa as a low cost / no electricity required solution. Evaporative cooling is less effective in high humidity, but works very well in hot weather.This discovery led me to something used in Spain called the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botijo]Botijos[/url] for cooling of drinking water.Working on the same principle, [url=http://www.urcomante.uva.es/Urcopedia/Ing-Botijo.php]one source[/url] suggests it to have been used since Neolithic times, becoming very popular during the bronze age, and only going out of use recently with the rise of the refrigerator.There's a nice online encyclopedia of sorts dedicated to the Botijo at [url=http://www.botijopedia.com/]botijopedia.com[/url].I think something like this would be a nice replacement for the Orange water cooler we use at Pennsic (though that worked very well this year!) but I haven't seriously investigated where I could acquire one, or how much it might cost.This interest is related to another I've had - that of acquiring a few Amphorae to leave around camp (if not actually transport wine in ;)