1968.01

Pillar-Moulded Bowl

Purchased. Ht 5.1cm; diam. 17cm.

Shallow bowl of pale greenish glass. The exterior is moulded into ribs but the lip is ground smooth. Intact and in good condition.

This dish was made by placing the glass over a mould, tooling it as it was revolved on a wheel. When the glass had cooled, the lip and interior were ground smooth on a wheel. There is a good description of the process by Stern, “Roman Vessel Glass from the Athenian Agora”, in: S. Vlizos (ed.), Η Αθήνα κατά τη Ρωμαϊκή εποχή : πρόσφατες ανακαλύψεις, νέες έρευνες. Athens During the Roman Period: Recent Discoveries, New Evidence (Athens 2008), esp. pp. 459-461.

The pale green colour is characteristic of earlier Roman glass (cf. 1966.68). The shape occurs over most of the western Empire, in Gaul, Germany, Spain and Italy, but there are also several examples from Corinth as well as some eastern sites (see Davidson, Corinth XII, 79 and 94-95, nos 595-598). Compare Kisa i, 81 fig. 41, and P. La Baume, Glas der antiken Welt i, no. C2, pl. 7, 2 with further references. There is a good example from the Antikythera shipwreck which has a good date in the second quarter of the first century BC. Note also the example from Pompeii illustrated in colour in A. de Franciscis, Il Museo Nazionale di Napoli (Cava dei Tirreni 1963) pl. XCIV. The type is classified in Isings, Roman Glass from Dated Finds 17-19, Form 3a.

Their latest datable findspots are early Flavian, but they were mostly produced in the Julio-Claudian period.

Folio Fine Art Ltd (London), Catalogue Roman Glass (November 1967) no. 106 (ill.); J.R. Green with B. Rawson, Catalogue of Antiquities in the Australian National University, A.N.U. (Canberra, 1981) 112; A Collection of Classics from the Holdings of the Australian National University Classics Department Museum. Drill Hall Gallery, The Australian National University, 20 March - 28 April 1996, 21 (ill.).