Chapter XI
. the history of pottery in that part of the ancient world came to an end. That is to say, that all later fabrics found in Greece or Asia Minor, even though they are sometimes of Roman date, belong to the lingering traces of a purely Hellenic development, and have no bearing on our present investigation.
The latter must therefore be limited to the countries of Western Europe, embracing—besides Italy—France, Germany, Britain, and Spain. The pottery found in these regions during the period of the Roman Empire is homogeneous in character, though greatly varying in merit, and so far as it can be traced to the victorious occupiers of those countries rather than to purely native workmanship, represents what we may call Roman pottery, as opposed to Greek or Graeco-Roman on the one hand and Celtic or Gaulish on the other.
2. TECHNICAL PROCESSES
Roman pottery, regarded from its purely technical aspect, is in some ways better known to us than Greek, chiefly owing to the extensive discoveries of kilns, furnaces, and potters’ apparatus, such as moulds and tools, in various parts of Western Europe. On the other hand, its classification is a much more difficult matter, although it has for so long been the subject of study, for reasons which will subsequently appear. This is perhaps partly due to the overwhelming interest which the discoveries of recent years have evoked in the study of Greek vases; and partly, of course, to the artistic superiority and more varied interest of the latter; but the mass of material now collected in the Museums of Italy and Central Europe is gradually impelling Continental scholars to bring to bear on Roman pottery the scientific methods now universally pursued in other directions. Of their work we shall speak more in detail in another chapter; for the present we must confine ourselves to the technical aspect of the subject.
The Romans, who used metal vases to a far greater extent than the Greeks—at least under the late Republic and Empire—did not hold the art of pottery in very high estimation, and their vases, like their tiles and lamps, were produced by slaves and freedmen, whereas at Athens the potter usually held at least the position of a resident alien. These were content to produce useful, but not as a rule fine or beautiful, vases, for the most part only adapted to the necessities of life. There was, so far as we know, no manufacture of vases set apart for religious purposes, either for funerary use or as votive offerings, and for the adornment of the house metal had the preference. It is not, therefore, surprising that we should find them making use of a less fine and compact paste for the greater proportion of their vases. With the exception of the fine red wares with reliefs, which are now generally known to archaeologists as _terra sigillata_,[3082] and which answered in public estimation to our porcelain, they made only common earthenware, and this was generally left unglazed.
All kinds of clays are used, varying with the different regions in which the pottery was made, and ranging in hue from black to grey, drab, yellow, brown, and red. In quality, too, the clay varies to a considerable extent, some being of a coarse, pebbly character. The red clay of the Allier district in France, where most of the Gaulish pottery was manufactured, is of a ferruginous nature; its natural colour is modified by baking, though it never becomes white.[3083] The pottery of St. Rémy-en-Rollat in that neighbourhood is made of the same white clay as the terracotta figures (p. 382).[3084] In Italy, as a rule, careful attention seems to have been paid to the preparing and mixing of the clay, and in the glazed red wares it is uniformly good. In fact, the remarkable similarity in technique and appearance of this ware throughout the Roman Empire has led to the view that there can only have been one centre from which it was exported. Against this, however, must be urged the undeniably provincial and almost barbarous character of the decoration on much of the pottery found in Central and Northern Europe; and therefore, without denying that exportation went on, as it undoubtedly did, we should prefer to suppose that this red glaze was produced in some special artificial manner, such as by using red ochre or iron oxide (see below), the knowledge of which became common property. As Semper said forty years ago[3085]: “Not only did barbarians, Gauls, Britons, and Germans, learn to know and use Roman technique, but also Egypt, Asia, and the Greeks, already immortalised by their own pottery, dropped their local processes, and voluntarily adopted Roman forms and technique.” Clay and glaze, form and technical method, are in all parts the same; it is only the decoration that varies and reflects the spirit and taste of the locality.
Formerly it was thought that the red glaze was obtained in the baking, after careful polishing of the surface, and that special means were adopted to this end. In the kilns of Castor (see below) Artis thought that he detected contrivances for this purpose; but it is now generally agreed that the glaze is artificial, not natural. In ordinary wares and in the lamps a red glaze is produced by a mere polishing of the surface, and this varies in tone and lustre with the proportion of oxide of iron in the paste, and the degree of heat employed in the baking. But in the _terra sigillata_ the red glaze reaches a high and uniform state of perfection. This seems to have been produced by a kind of varnish, the elements of which are not absolutely certain; but it would appear that the substance added to produce the effect was of an essentially alkaloid nature. This has been deduced by Dragendorff[3086] from a series of analyses made from fragments of different wares, both without and with the glaze; in the latter case the alkaloid constituents show a marked increase in quantity, whereas the proportion of the iron oxide and other elements remain constant. These investigations were made by Dr. Lilienthal, of Dorpat, on five fragments: (1) from a vase of the Republican period found at Corneto; (2) from a bowl of fine _terra sigillata_ of the first century after Christ; (3) from a deep cup of the same style; (4) from late provincial ware of the second or third century; (5) from a degenerate fabric with rough clay and inferior glaze, the results being as follows:—
1. Without glaze[3087]:
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) Silica 55·08 52·87 52·054 54·75 66·70 Clay earth 23·10 23·95 — 18·82 21·01 Iron oxide 14·13 4·78 13·966 14·48 5·89 Carbonate of lime 5·22 13·80 — 5·30 3·20 Magnesia 0·75 2·35 1·850 3·38 1·26 Potash 0·79 0·89 1·852 1·55 1·02 Carbonate of sodium 0·28 0·45 0·523 0·53 0·57
2. With glaze[3088]:
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) Silica 54·18 — 51·924 53·70 — Clay 21·31 — — 16·93 — Iron 15·00 — 12·168 14·70 — Carbonate of lime 6·01 — — 5·82 — Magnesia 1·94 3·12 2·201 5·72 2·05 Potash 0·95 1·06 2·210 1·82 1·27 Carbonate of sodium 0·37 0·49 0·921 0·62 0·69
It must be borne in mind that, although the final effect is due to the alkaloids, the red colour of the vases is produced by the iron oxide which was inherent in the composition of the clay, none being added with the varnish, as the quantities show. All the fragments also showed traces of manganese and sulphuric acid. Previously analyses had been given by Brongniart and Blümner,[3089] with results approximately similar, but not so definite. Fabroni had thought that the iron oxide was combined with a vitreous paste,[3090] and Keller, by practical experiments, essayed to show that borax was employed to provide the required appearance,[3091] and further maintained that the furnace at Castor already alluded to was used for dissolving that substance. He was not far from the truth, but the results obtained by Dragendorff seem to militate against his conclusions.
In any case the glaze is very perfect, of so bright a red as to resemble coral, and serving, as Blümner says, to enhance the ground colour where a modern glaze would only conceal its imperfect tone. It is so fine and so carefully laid on that it does not interfere with any outlines or details, in this again evincing its superiority to modern glaze. It seems to have been applied not with the brush, but by dipping the vase into the liquid.[3092] Black glaze, such as occurs on the earlier Italian fabrics (p. 481), was produced from an alkaline silicate.[3093]
The ordinary unglazed wares were classified by Brongniart under four heads[3094]: (1) pale yellow; (2) red (dark red to red-brown; first century of Empire); (3) grey or ash-coloured (down to the end of the Western Empire); (4) black (mainly provincial). This distribution was in its general lines adopted by subsequent writers, such as Buckman[3095] and Birch, but was felt to be inadequate, and some slight modifications were adopted. For practical purposes, however, it will be found to work fairly well as a convenient method of grouping the commoner wares. None of them as a rule have any decoration. They will be considered in fuller detail in a subsequent chapter.
* * * * *
In the manufacture of vases the Romans used the same processes as the Greeks. They were made on the wheel (_rota figularis_ or _orbis_),[3096] to which allusion is not infrequently made by the Latin poets, as in the well-known line of Horace[3097]:—
Amphora cepit Institui; currente rota cur urceus exit?
And, again, in the phrase _totus, teres, atque rotundus_[3098] he is doubtless referring to a vase just turned off the wheel. Tibullus speaks of “slippery clay fashioned on the wheel of Cumae”[3099]; and there are also allusions in Plautus and other writers.[3100] The simile has also been drawn upon by English poets.[3101] Specimens of potters’ wheels have been found at Arezzo and at Nancy; these are made of terracotta, pierced in the centre for the axis of the pivot, and furnished at the circumference with small cylinders of lead, to give purchase for the hand and steadiness to the whirling wheel.[3102] Another from Lezoux, now in the Museum at Roanne, is figured by M. Déchelette.[3103] Most of the common wares were made by this process, except the _dolia_, or large casks, which were built up on a frame like the Greek pithos (Vol. I. p. 152).
But for the ornamented vases with reliefs an additional process was necessary in order to produce the raised ornament, and they were in nearly all cases produced from moulds, like the lamps or terracotta figures and reliefs.[3104] The vases were still fashioned on the wheel, but this was done in the mould from which the reliefs were obtained. Occasionally the reliefs were modelled by hand or with the aid of tools, or even produced with a brush full of thick slip (_en barbotine_), but moulding was the general rule. This method entailed three distinct stages, of which the first alone required artistic capacity; the other two were purely mechanical, requiring only a certain technical dexterity. The first was that of making the stamps from which the designs were impressed; the second, the making of the moulds; the third, impressing the clay in the mould.
The stamps were made of clay, gypsum, wood, or metal, and had a handle at the back for holding while pressing them into the mould; they were used not only for figures and ornamental designs, but also for the potter’s signature (see below). Only clay examples, however, have been preserved, but some of these are admirable specimens. Frequently the subjects on the Arretine vases were taken, like those on lamps and mural reliefs, from existing works of art, especially from the “new Attic” reliefs to which allusion has already been made (p. 368), and the stamps are directly copied from these sources. An instance of this is a stamp from Arezzo in the British Museum, with a beautiful figure of Spring (Plate LXVI. fig. 2), which finds its counterpart on a complete vase from Capua (Fig. 219), and also on a mural relief (B.M. D 583). Another good example in the same collection represents a slave bending over a vessel on a fire, and shielding his face from the heat with one hand. From the same site are two others representing respectively a boar and a lion. A fourth stamp found at Arezzo, with a tragic mask, is given in Fig. 211.[3105] The stamps must have been articles of commerce, and handed down from one potter to another, as the subjects are found repeated in different places; the majority were probably made at Arezzo and other important places in Italy.
Among examples from the provinces may be mentioned one in the British Museum (Romano-British collection), with the figure of a youth, inscribed OFFI(_cina_) LIBERTI; it is of fine terracotta, and was found at Mainz. A stamp with the figure of Paris or Atys is in the museum of the Philosophical Society at York.[3106] Other stamps in the form of a hare and a lion in the Sèvres Museum are inscribed with the name of Cerialis, a well-known German potter, whose name also occurs on a mould for a large bowl with a frieze of combatants in the British Museum, and in the former museum are six others, including one of a wolf, with the name of a Gaulish potter, Cobnertus.[3107] Von Hefner mentions one found at Rheinzabern with a figure of a gladiator at each end, inscribed P · ATTI · CLINI · O(_fficina_), and others from Westerndorf with a lion and a horse.[3108] Dies for stamping the potters’ names have been found at Lezoux in Auvergne, and in Luxemburg, with the names of Auster (AVSTRI · OF) and Cobnertus, and Roach-Smith possessed one with the latter name[3109]; in the Sèvres Museum is also a stamp for making rows of pattern (see below),[3110] and at Rheinzabern one for an egg-and-tongue moulding was found.[3111] Specimens of these stamps are given in Fig. 211.
[Illustration: FIG. 211. STAMPS USED BY ROMAN POTTERS.]
The moulds were made of a somewhat lighter clay than that of the vases, but it was essential that the material should be sufficiently porous to absorb the moisture of the pressed-in clay of the vase; sometimes holes for the water to escape through are visible. They were made on the wheel, and had a ridge on the exterior for convenience in handling; they were made whole, not in halves, but sometimes the vase was first made plain, and the figures were then attached from separate moulds, or rather made separately, as in the case of the “Megarian” bowls (Vol. I. p. 499).[3112] Vases have been found in the Rhone valley ornamented with large _appliqué_ medallions, and the separate moulds for these also exist; they seem to have been made at Vienne.[3113] The figures and ornaments were impressed into the moulds from the stamps while the paste was still soft, leaving hollow impressions to receive the clay of the vases. Similarly, continuous patterns, such as rows of beads or dots, were traced in the mould with a roller or wheel-like instrument on which the pattern was cut in relief.[3114] Any defects or careless arrangement in the completed vase would of course be due to a careless insertion of the stamps in the mould.
There are large numbers of moulds for Roman and provincial vases in existence,[3115] and the British Museum has a fine though fragmentary series from Arezzo, intended for some of the finest specimens of the local ware; of these more will be said in the following chapter. Many of these moulds have been found on sites of potteries in Gaul, especially in the Auvergne and Bourbonnais districts, and are collected in the Moulins, Roanne, St. Germain, and other museums. Lezoux was an important centre in this respect, and here also were found moulds for patterns and ornaments.[3116] In the British Museum (Romano-British collection) there is part of a mould for a shallow bowl, found at Rheinzabern, with stamped designs of a lion, boar, and hare pursuing one another; it is similar to the mould with Cerialis’ name already described. These _matrices_ are usually of fine bright red clay, unglazed; they are very porous, rapidly absorbing moisture, and easily allowing the potter to withdraw the vessel from the mould. The importance of the discovery of moulds can hardly be overrated for the evidence they afford as to the site of potteries and centres of fabrics[3117]; it is obvious that where they are found, and only in such places, the vases must have been made; and that the discovery of a potter’s name on any mould establishes his workshop at the place where it was found. Various tools for working the moulds, or touching up details or damaged parts of bronze and ivory, have been found on the sites of ancient potteries,[3118] as at Arezzo, but their use cannot be accurately determined.
The method of decoration known as _en barbotine_, which is a sort of cross between painting and relief, was achieved by the laying on of a semi-liquid clay slip with a brush, a spatula, or a small tube. The pattern was probably first lightly indicated, and the viscous paste was then laid on in thick lines or masses, producing a sort of low relief. The process was, as a rule, only employed for simple ornamentation, such as leaves, sprays, and garlands; but on the provincial black wares it finds a freer scope. On vases found in Britain and the adjoining parts of the Continent (p. 544) figures of animals are rendered in this manner, and on another class peculiar to Germany (p. 537) inscriptions are painted in a thick white slip. The colour of the slip did not necessarily correspond to the clay of the vase, and was, in fact, usually white. These vases are, however, technically poor, and the reliefs heavy and irregular. The process has been aptly compared to the sugar ornamentation on cakes.[3119]
Painted decoration is almost unknown in Roman pottery, and is, in fact, confined to the POCOLOM series described in