Monthly Archives: December 2014

VM_365 Day 175 Rare samian beaker from Minster

Photos: Lloyd Bosworth, University of Kent
Photos: Lloyd Bosworth, University of Kent

The image for VM_365 Day 175 shows sherds of a samian ware beaker found at the Roman villa, Minister.

Samian ware was the high quality table ware of the Roman world, made in Gaul, and it came in both plain and decorated types. At a villa site we might expect to see quite a bit of samian ware but whilst it is often present we have to wonder if the villa owners and guests also had something better to call on too to drink and eat from such as glass or silver vessels.

Typically samian drinking vessels are undecorated cups, but this vessel will have been more striking, more costly and more prestigious with its decorated design. It is an example of the type we call Déch. 64, after the pioneer French samian scholar Joseph Déchelette who described many samian vessels and their decoration (there will be more on him in a later post).

This is a rare form even amongst imported samian ware and so may have been especially prized at the villa. In this case we can fortunately see the name of the maker of the vessel as his workshop stamp is present. Decorated samian was made using a mould; here the potter making the mould impressed the die stamp bearing his workshop name in the mould, only it was impressed upside-down. Hence on the vessels made from this mould the name appears ’round the wrong way’ or ‘retrograde’ and upside-down.

Thoughtful potters took care over how the design appeared, but often we see mistakes in the impressed names. The stamp here reads ‘OFFILIBERTI’ (the ‘o’ is missing’) representing  officina Libertus (‘the workshop of Libertus’). The lower photo shows the stamp here turned 180 degrees to read correctly. Libertus ii, as he is known, was active in Lezoux in Central Gaul in the early second century (c. AD 105-130) and his workshop has been found by archaeologists and examined. This stamp is his stamp die 2a as catalogued by Hartley and Dickinson in their monumental corpus of the stamps of samian potters.

A mould for this type of beaker was found at his workshop, but very few examples of the actual beaker with this stamp have been found in the Roman provinces. The decoration here includes a figure with arms raised which may be a rather bulky depiction of Venus, or it is a type where the figure holds a large theatrical mask above its head, only in this case there is no mask. There is a rather plump bird and also on the right side of the figure is the front part of a small deer with its head turned backwards on a tilt and its antlers therefore are pointing to the ground. These small figure types are appropriate for the size of the beaker and typical of the Roman classical world where animals are often shown.

We might imagine the Roman  owner exclaimed their unhappiness when this vessel broke, especially if it contained a nice beverage at the time.

Dr Steve Willis, University of Kent

References

Hartley, B. & Dickinson, B. 2010. Names on Terra Sigillata. An index of makers’ stamps and signatures on Gallo-Roman Terra Sigillata (samian ware), Volume 5, London.

Stanfield, J. & Simpson, G. 1958. Central Gaulish Potters, Oxford University Press, London.

VM_365 Day 174 Roman Chalk vessel from Broadstairs

VM 174

The image for Day 174 of the  VM_365 project shows fragments of a nearly complete vessel carved from a chalk block found at the Roman building at Fort Hill, Broadstairs in 2009.

The vessel was found in  a deposit of building tumble  within the remains of a cellar. The edges of the separate fragments are worn and the breaks are abraded. The vessel is roughly diamond shaped and its outer dimensions measure 0.25 metres by 0.25 metres and 0.22 metres high.

The base and edges of the vessel are rounded and the outer surface has been dressed with small tool marks visible on the surface. One edge may be incomplete although its edge appears worn rather than broken. The inner dimensions of the vessel measure 0.12 by 0.12 metres and 0.13 metres deep with near vertical sides and a slightly rounded base with a smooth, lightly pitted inner surface.

The function of the vessel is unclear. Its size and shape raises some interesting possibilities in its interpretation. The bowl could have been supported upright by a free standing frame or set into a structure. Although there is no evidence of mortar adhering to it, it could have been set into a wall possibly to form a niche. It may be that it was not originally intended to rest on its base at all, but one of its flat sides. It is also feasible that one edge was originally shallower in depth than the others.

What could the vessel have held? There is no residue remaining in its interior to aid with interpretation. As a vessel it could have been used in a domestic kitchen or perhaps it was used in a more religious or ritual context perhaps for washing hands or for water purification possibly with a subsidiary vessel inside it. As a niche the vessel could have been used to hold a candle or perhaps form part of a shrine holding a household deity.

VM_365 Day 172 Early Neolithic Pottery from Ramsgate

VM 172Today’s VM_365 image for Day 172 shows one of the sherds of pottery found  in 2007 in the ditch fills of an Early Neolithic causewayed enclosure at Court Stairs, Ramsgate.
This sherd is typical of the Southern Decorated tradition which was current during the second half of the Early Neolithic, broadly datable to between c.3600-3350 BC. In this case, the sherd has been indirectly dated by Carbon dating of an ox skull to 3636-3625 cal. BC.

VM_365 Day 171 A feast of flintwork, blades from Neolithic site at Pegwell

Selection of flint baldes from Neolithic site at Pegwell Bay
Selection of flint blades from Neolithic site at Pegwell Bay

Today’s image for VM_365 Day 171 is of a selection of blade flakes from the flintwork that was found in an excavation on a site at Courtstairs, near Pegwell Bay in 2007.

Although only one stretch of conjoined pits forming a curving line were exposed in the excavation, the finds from the site showed that a sample of the second Neolithic Causewayed enclosure to be found in Ramsgate area had been revealed.

Most of the finely worked flint dated to the Earlier Neolithic period, however a significant proportion was residual, with only a few contexts containing only fresh-looking single period lithics.  Other contexts had a mix of fresh and earlier residual material.

Many blade flakes were recovered from the pit fills, some contexts producing significant quantities. Finely worked blades and bladelets which had been soft hammer-struck from blade cores were particularly common, with serrated blades frequently represented.

The flintwork form this site is a rich source of information on the craft and technology in use in this period and there will be more to come from this site in future VM_365 posts.

 

 

VM_365 Day 170 Reconstructed Iron Age comb decorated jar

Late Iron Age 'Belgic' comb decorated jar.
Late Iron Age ‘Belgic’ comb decorated jar.

The image for VM_365 Day 170 is of the reconstructed profile of a Late Iron Age jar with a beaded rim and combed surface decoration. This pot was found broken into many pieces in the lower fill deposits at the base of a storage pit, during an excavation on the site of Margate Football club in 2003.

The vessel is made from a grog tempered  fabric, meaning that crushed pot has been used as a filler to stiffen the clay in the body of the vessel. Pots of this type were common in the later Iron Age period 50BC to 25AD.

Vessels with these characteristics are often classed as ‘Belgic’, after Julius Caeser’s assertion that the Iron Age tribes of southern Britain, including Kent, were related to the tribes of Belgae, who lived around the northern coast of Gaul between the west bank of the Rhine to the Channel

The comb decoration has only been applied to the upper section of pot. The area below the rim was decorated with a circuit of horizontal combed lines, then the shoulders and sides of the pot were covered using a series of arching strokes from just below the horizontal line toward the middle and lower part of the vessel.

The comb decoration was common in the Late Iron Age period and there are several variations represented in the application of the decoration among the vessels found in Thanet.

VM_365 Day 169 Where earth and sky meet. Iron Age potters surface decoration techniques

VM 169-1The image for VM_365 Day 169 shows a series of pottery sherds from Iron Age kitchen/storage-ware vessels from Margate, which have deliberately applied clay coarsening on the surface. The general currency of coarsewares of this type was the Early to Mid Iron Age period, between c.600 and 350 BC.

Some of the bodysherds show how the appearance of different methods of surface treatment; wet clay slurried; ‘pebble-dashed’ tacky; lumpy, sometimes produce almost bizarre surface effects on the vessels.

Some of the sherds show how the rustication tended mostly to be applied below the shoulder, although as one of the examples shows it is not always the case.

It has been suggested, with some reference to the contrast of application of coloured finishes to contemporary Halstatt/La Tene art styles, that the very evident tonal variation of the vessel finishes, the smooth and the coarse elements of the pattern, had some meaning for the maker. With the rusticated coarsewares of this type it has been suggested that the difference in visual tone represents a smooth sky or heaven above the rough lumpy surface of the earth below.

Maybe it is simply a practical innovation, without such embedded symbolism, simply making an easy-grip surface for greasy fingers on large heavy pots.

VM_365 Day 168 Retouched Flint Arrowhead

VM 168

Today’s VM_365 Day 168 image shows a late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age arrowhead from Cliffsend.
This barbed and tanged arrowhead had broken along one of the barbs and instead of being discarded, the edge was retouched so it could be reused.

Other examples of flint objects that have been reworked into a useable object following damaged were posted for Day 165 and Day 50.

VM_365 Day 166 Palaeolithic Hand Axe from Westwood, Broadstairs

VM 166

Today’s VM 365 image for day 166 shows the two faces of a small flint Palaeolithic hand axe which was found at Westwood, Broadstairs in 2000.

The axe is of Acheulian pointed heavy butted type and measures less that 10cm in length. It is unpatinated and is sharp on its edges and struck facets indicating that it had not moved far from the place where it was lost or discarded approximately 400,000 years ago.