Things That Travelled: Mediterranean Glass in the First Millennium Ce
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i Things that Travelled ii iii Things that Travelled Mediterranean Glass in the First Millennium CE Edited by Daniela Rosenow, Matt Phelps, Andrew Meek and Ian Freestone iv First published in 2018 by UCL Press University College London Gower Street London WC1E 6BT Available to download free: www.ucl.ac.uk/ ucl- press Text © Contributors, 2018 Images © Contributors and copyright holders named in the captions, 2018 The authors have asserted their rights under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the authors of this work. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from The British Library. This book is published under a Creative Commons CC BY- NC- SA license (CC BY- NC- SA 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, redistribute and adapt the work for non- commercial use, provided the original author and source are credited and that modified versions use the same license. Attribution should include the following information: Rosenow et al. (eds). 2018. Things that Travelled: Mediterranean Glass in the First Millennium CE. London: UCL Press. DOI: https://doi.org/ 10.14324/ 111.9781787351172 Further details about Creative Commons licenses are available at http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/ ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 119- 6 (Hbk.) ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 118- 9 (Pbk.) ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 117- 2 (PDF) ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 120- 2 (epub) ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 164- 6 (mobi) ISBN: 978- 1- 78735- 121- 9 (html) DOI: https://doi.org/10.14324/111.9781787351172 v Foreword Archaeological discoveries and scientific analysis have combined to bring about a revolution in our ability to understand ancient glass over the past 20 years, and arguably this new understanding has been most profoundly felt in investigation of the natron glass industry of the first millennium CE. The recognition that the majority of glass was made from sand and soda in the eastern Mediterranean, then shipped as unworked chunks to be shaped in glass workshops across the known world, has led to renewed interest in glass as an item of trade, and the ebb and flow of its manufacture and movement. The present volume grew out of a symposium held to address issues around the movement of glass. In November 2014, 125 delegates from across the world attended a two- day conference held in the British Museum, the Wallace Collection and UCL’s Institute of Archaeology. It was organised by UCL’s Early Glass Technology Research Network (EGTRN), the Association for the History of Glass (AHG) and the British Museum. The success of the meeting and the high level of dis- cussion prompted us to explore the possibility of a volume on the topic and number of participants agreed to prepare chapters related to their contributions. The title, Things that Travelled: Mediterranean Glass in the First Millennium CE, references a 2004 article by the late David Whitehouse (‘ “Things That Travelled”: The Surprising Case of Raw Glass’, Early Medieval Europe 12 (3), 301– 5). Whitehouse’s article was intended to be ‘an interim report on work in progress on glass’ and was inspired by Michael McCormick’s Origins of the European Economy: Communications and Commerce, AD 300–900 (Cambridge University Press, 2001) who had expressed the hope that, in the near future, archaeologists would contribute fresh information on the movement of ceramics and glass. Ten years later, it seemed to be a fitting time for archaeologists and scientists to give an update on their progress. v vi The volume aims to contribute to our understanding of glass pro- duction, distribution, trade and technologies and to contextualise this material within the social, economic and cultural framework of ancient societies. Chapters encompass various glass artefact groups (jewellery, vessels, secondary and primary production remains) from a plethora of regions such as Greece (Antonaras), Bulgaria (Cholakova and Rehren), Cyprus (Cosyns and Ceglia), the Libyan Sahara (Duckworth and Mattingly), Egypt (Rosenow and Rehren), Italy (Maltoni et al., Silvestri et al.), Jordan (O’Hea), Israel (Phelps), Britain (Sainsbury, Davis and Freestone), covering the Roman, Late Antique and early Islamic periods. Aspects discussed include the place of origin and production of raw glass, technology, patterns of distribution and trade, raw glass ingredients, the usage and spread of specific object groups such as gold- glass (Cesarin, Walker et al.), gems (Antonaras) or objects made of emerald green glass (Cottam and Jackson), as well as the relationship between objects made of glass and other materials. Analytical chapters focus on the chemical definition, introduction and distribution of various raw glass groups such as HIMT glass (Freestone et al.), aspects such as glass recycling (Sainsbury), the supply and trade of natron and plant ash glass in Upper Egypt (Rosenow and Rehren), and the characterisation of new plant ash glass groups in early Islamic Palestine (Phelps). We would like to thank all authors of the chapters included here as well as the other contributors to the conference for presenting their research. Further thanks are due to the British Museum, the Wallace Collection, and UCL’s Institute of Archaeology for providing conference space; to UCL and the Association for the History of Glass for providing funding (grants for travel and accommodation for participants, print per- missions for images); and to UCL Press. Finally, we would like to thank all those students of UCL who helped in the organisation of the conference, in particular Laura Adlington, Ana Franjić, Umberto Veronesi, Carlotta Farci, Nyree Manoukian, Martina Bertini and Jo Ahmet. The Editors vi FOREWORD vii Contents List of figures ix List of tables xvi List of contributors xviii 1 A special group of early Christian glass ‘gems’ from Greece 1 AnAstAssios Ch. AntonArAs 2 Gold- glasses: From their origin to Late Antiquity in the Mediterranean 22 GiuliA CEsArin 3 A Late Antique manganese- decolourised glass composition: Interpreting patterns and mechanisms of distribution 46 AnAstAsiA CholAkovA And thilo RehrEn 4 Glass production and consumption in Cyprus in Late Antiquity (fourth– seventh century CE) 72 PEtEr Cosyns And AndrEA CEGliA 5 Things that travelled: Precious things for special people? 92 sAlly CottAm And CArolinE JACkson 6 Trading North: Glass- working beyond the edge of the empire 107 mAry Davis And iAn C. FrEEstonE 7 Into Africa: The biography of Roman vessel glass in the Sahara Desert 134 Chloë n. duCkworth And David J. mAttinGly 8 HIMT, glass composition and commodity branding in the primary glass industry 159 iAn C. FrEEstonE, PAtriCk dEGrysE, JAmEs lAnkton, BErnArd GrAtuzE And J. sChnEidEr vii viii 9 Consumption, working and trade of Late Antique glass from north Adriatic Italy: An archaeometric perspective 191 sArAh mAltoni, FilomEnA GAllo, AlBErtA silvEstri, mAriAngelA Vandini, TaniA Chinni, AlEssAndrA mArCAntE, GiAnmArio molin And EnriCo CirElli 10 How clean is your (glass)house?: A Late Antique glass workshop at Pella in Jordan 215 mArgarEt o’hEA 11 Glass supply and trade in early Islamic Ramla: An investigation of the plant ash glass 236 mAtt PhElPs 12 A view from the South: Roman and Late Antique glass from Armant, Upper Egypt 283 DaniElA rosEnow And thilo RehrEn 13 When things stopped travelling: Recycling and the glass industry in Britain from the first to fifth century CE 324 viCtoriA A. sAinsBury 14 Things that travelled: A review of the Roman glass from northern Adriatic Italy 346 AlBErtA silvEstri, FilomEnA GAllo, sArAh mAltoni, PAtriCk dEGrysE, moniCA GAnio, Antonio lonGinElli And GiAnmArio molin 15 Patterns in production: The Wilshere Collection of gold- glass examined 368 susAn WalkEr, AndrEw shortlAnd And JuliAn hEndErson Index 384 viii CONTENTS ix List of figures 1.1 Glass gems from Vasileos Irakleiou 44, Thessaloniki. Dating from the second half of the sixth century 3 1.2 Glass gems, Solinos Basilica, c. sixth century 5 1.3 Glass gems, Basilica in Ierisos, c. sixth century 6 1.4 Glass gem, Basilica in Fourka, c. sixth century 7 1.5 Glass gems, Louloudies Kitrous, c. sixth century 8 1.6 Glass gem, Dion, c. sixth century 9 1.7 Glass gem, Velika, c. sixth century 9 1.8 Glass gem, Yenikapi, c. fifth– sixth century 10 1.9 Glass gem, Corinth, Roman period 11 1.10 Forms of gems depicted on mosaics from Thessaloniki and Ravenna and their glass prototypes 17 2.1 Glass ring with gold- leaf, representing a winged figure, probably a Nike 25 2.2 Sandwich gold- glass bowl from Canosa (Apulia) 28 2.3 Mosaic glass plate containing gold- glass tesserae from Canosa (Apulia) 30 2.4 Gold- band glass alabastron 31 2.5 Gold- band glass unguentarium 32 2.6 Fondo d’oro 34 2.7 Bottom of cup, with gilded inscription 35 2.8 Fragmentary Nuppenglas bowl from St Severin (Cologne) 36 2.9 Blue glass ewer with gilded decoration 37 2.10 Mediterranean basin. The different areas probably involved in gold- glass production through centuries 41 3.1 Examples of unworked glass chunks and vessel fragments, various shapes and techniques of manufacture and decoration, characteristic of the Mn- decolourised composition in Dichin, Serdica and Odartsi assemblages 56 ix x 3.2 Alumina to titania ratio versus values of manganese oxide in the samples in the present study compared to respective data from the Balkans, Southern France and Britain, and to some well- recognised compositional groups of Late Antiquity (i.e. Levantine I, HIMT, série 2.1) 61 3.3 Average concentrations of trace oxides indicative of glass recycling in the samples of Mn- decolourised composition série 3.2 and série 2.1 from Dichin, Serdica and Odartsi site assemblages 66 4.1 Map of Cyprus with all the relevant sites 75 4.2 Prevailing summer surface currents and tides in the Mediterranean and Black Sea 77 4.3 The different functional types of glass material from the early Christian basilica of Yeroskipou- Ayioi Pente 80 4.4 The various glass vessel shapes from the early Christian basilica from Yeroskipou- Ayioi Pente 81 4.5 (a) honeycomb decorated hemispherical bowl (ID no.