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The Roman Pewter-Moulds from Silchester

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2011

Thomas Blagg  and
Susan Read
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Summary

Pieces of six limestone moulds for the casting of pewter vessels, found on the Forum site at Silchester, are described and illustrated. Five were for casting three types of dish or plate. Two were moulded on both sides to form part of nests of moulds. The sixth piece was the inner mould for a cup or flagon. The techniques of manufacture are considered. The grooves for casting the rims and feet appear to be compass-drawn, but it is argued that there is no evidence that the moulds were lathe-turned.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Antiquaries Journal , Volume 57 , Issue 2 , September 1977 , pp. 270 - 276
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1977

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References

NOTES

1 Society of Antiquaries of London, Fox Collection, box 4·64.

2 Bush, T. S., Proc. Soc. Antiq. London2, xxii (1908), 34–Google Scholar8, with reference by Hope to the Silchester finds.

3 Boon, G. C., Silchester: The Roman Town of Calleva (Newton Abbott, 1974), p. 274, fig. 40.Google Scholar

4 Goodall, I. H., Yorks. Arch. Journ. xliv (1972), 32–7.Google Scholar

5 The authors thank the Director of the Reading Museum for permission to publish these moulds from the Duke of Wellington's Silchester collection, and Mr. David Brown of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, who read this paper in draft, for his helpful criticism and suggestions.

6 Langton: Goodall, , op. cit.Google Scholar; St. Just: Brown, P. D. C., Cornish Archaeol. ix (1970), 107–10Google Scholar. Goodall discusses (p. 35) the manner in which the casting was done; see also the recent work by Brown, note 30 below.

7 Op. cit. (notes 1 and 3 above).

8 Goodall, , op. cit., 34.Google Scholar

9 Wedlake, W. J., Excavations at Camerton, Somerset (Bath, 1958), p. 84 and pl. xviia.Google Scholar

10 Blagg, T. F. C., Britannia, vii (1976), 152–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar, where other tools and techniques of the stonemason are also considered.

11 Mutz, A., however, in Die Kunst des Metalldrehens bei den Römern (Basel and Stuttgart, 1972), p. 38CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Bild 53, cites a limestone bowl mould from Lyons with traces of lathe-turning on the inside wall; there is, however, no hole, and one wonders whether these could not be the marks of non-mechanical abrasion. Mr. David Brown has also called our attention to the chisel marks which are visible on the surface of the Lansdown moulds.

12 Orlandos, A., Les Matiriaux de Construction et la Technique Architectural des Anciens Grecs (Paris, 1968), ii, fig. 60.Google Scholar

13 Bailey, D. M. in Roman Crafts, ed. Strong, Donald and Brown, David (London 1976), p. 98Google Scholar, pl. 174; for Lansdown, Bush, , op. cit., plate facing p. 38Google Scholar.

14 Peal, C. A., Proc. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. lx (1967), 26Google Scholar, no. 4c(i) and references on p. 27 (Manton); Brown, P. D. C., Oxoniensia, xxxviii (1973), 192Google Scholar, and fig. 3,nos. 17 and 18 (Appleford).

15 British Museum 71.7-4·6. Peal, , op. cit. 26, no. 1b.Google Scholar

16 Sunter, N. J. in Cunliffe, B., Roman Bath (Society of Antiquaries of London Research Report no. xxiv, Oxford, 1969), p. 67Google Scholar, no. 1, and fig. 25.

17 As on the Langton mould: Goodall, , op. cit. (note 4 above), 33, fig. 1.Google Scholar

18 Peal, , loc. cit. (note 14 above), nos. 3 and 3a.Google Scholar

19 Bush, , op. cit. (note 2), p. 37Google Scholar illustrated by Richmond, I. A. in Wacher, J. S., ed., The Civitas Capitals of Roman Britain (Leicester, 1966), pl. xGoogle Scholar.

20 Brown, , op. cit. (note 14 above) p. 190Google Scholar, fig. no. 16; p. 192, fig. 3 no. 20; p. 194, fig. 4, nos. 21 and 22. Peal, op. cit., classifies the general type and illustrates a number of widely spread examples.

21 Britannia Romana, portfolio IV, f. 3.

22 Devizes Museum Catalogue part II (1934), p. 182, no. 709, and pl. LVII, 5. The drawing does not, unfortunately, include an internal profile, but this is in fact almost identical with the Wit combe example; we are grateful to Mr. David Brown for sight of a copy of his own drawing. In the catalogue it is shown and described as having a circular stone cover ‘fitting it like that of a jar’. We have not had an opportunity of inspecting this, but it does not read as though it incorporates a core of the mould similar to that from Silchester.

23 We are grateful to David Brown for pointing this out to us and suggesting the alternative interpretation.

24 An example of each is conveniently illustrated by Liversidge, J., ‘A New Hoard o f Romano-British Pewter from Icklingham,’ Proc. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. lii (1959), pi. IIIGoogle Scholar.

25 Displayed in the British Museum. Read, C. H., Archaeologia, lvi (1898), 11, no. 12, and fig. 6Google Scholar.

26 Archaeologia, liii (1893), 564.Google Scholar

27 Sunter, , op. cit. (note 16 above), p. 70Google Scholar, and fig. 25, nos. 11 and 12.

28 Read, , loc. cit., no. 14.Google Scholar

29 There are three biconical flagons; but that illustrated by Boon, (op. cit., note 3 above, p. 229Google Scholar, fig. 35) does not have the angular profile of the Bath and Appleshaw examples and of the vessel cast in this mould.

30 For the technique see Brown, David, ‘Bronze and Pewter’, in Strong, Donald and Brown, David, eds., Roman Crafts (London, 1976), pp. 33 ff.Google Scholar