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Cosmetic sets from Late Iron Age and Roman Britain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 November 2011

Ralph Jackson
Ralph Jackson
Affiliation:
Dept. Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities, British Museum
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Extract

In 1980, during British Museum excavations at Stonea Grange, Cambs., a group of metal finds collected over a number of years in the fields surrounding the site, were shown to the writer. They included two examples (FIG. 1) of an enigmatic class of small cast bronze object first discussed more than sixty years ago by Reginald Smith. They are still ill-understood, but not uncommon; the present catalogue, certainly incomplete, contains 99 examples.

Type
Articles
Information
Britannia , Volume 16 , November 1985 , pp. 165 - 192
Copyright
Copyright © Ralph Jackson 1985. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Valery Rigby and Ian Stead first suggested a cosmetic use for these instruments. I am indebted to them for much useful discussion, and for details of several finds. I am grateful also to Catherine Johns, Tim Potter and Philip Compton for help and advice; to Meredydd Moores, Robert Pengelly, Philip Compton and Victor Bowley for FIG. 1, FIG. 2 and PL. XIIA and PL. XIIB respectively; to Bob Trett for information on many new finds from Norfolk and Suffolk; and to the following and many others who kindly gave assistance: George Boon, Richard Brewer, Pan Garrard, Alec Down, Ann Bone, Rosemary Gilmour, Stephen Clews, Martin Winter, John Magilton, Christine Jones, Angela Wardle, Deborah French, Pamela Clarke, Mike Stone, Glenys Lloyd-Morgan.

2 Smith, R. A., ‘on a peculiar type of Roman bronze pendant’ Proc. Soc. Antiqs. 2nd series xxx (1918), 54–63Google Scholar. Many examples from East Anglia have recently been published by Trett, R. ‘Roman bronze grooved pendants from East Anglia’, Norfolk Archaeology xxxviii Part iii (1983), 219–34.Google Scholar

3 Coincidentally Smith (op. cit. 55), in describing nose-bands and ‘brays’, compared their chafing action to that of a pestle and mortar, for, though he did not realise it, this is certainly the way in which the instruments under discussion were used.

4 e.g. Ham Hill: VCH Somerset (1906)Google Scholar, fig. 63, no. 12, and Lydney: R. E. M. and Wheeler, T. V., Lydney (1932), fig. 11, nos. 9. 12.Google Scholar

5 Down, A., Chichester III (1978), 293.Google Scholar

6 Boon, G. C., ‘The Roman Material’ in Mason, E. J., ‘Ogof-yr-Esgyrn, Dan-yr-Ogof Caves, Brecknock, Excavations 1938–50’ Arch. Camb. cxvii (1968), 48.Google Scholar

7 Wheeler, R. E. M., The Roman Fort near Brecon (1926), 116Google Scholar; Brailsford, J. W. in Sir Richmond, I. A., Hod Hill II (1968), 113.Google Scholar

8 e.g. Webster, G. in Wacher, J. and McWhirr, A., Cirencester Excavations I (1982), 112.Google Scholar

9 e.g. Hod Hill: Brailsford, J. W.Hod Hill I (1962), fig. 3, A38–A42.Google Scholar

10 ibid. fig. 3, A38, A42–43.Google Scholar

11 ibid. fig. 3, A44–45.Google Scholar

12 Ulbert, G., Die Römischen Donaukastelle Aislingen und Burghöfe, Limesforschungen I (1959), Taf, 20, 9.Google Scholar

13 e.g. Birrens: Robertson, A. S., Birrens (Blatobulgium) (1975), 121, fig. 38, no. 5Google Scholar; South Shields: Allason-Jones, L. and Miket, R., Catalogue of small finds from South Shields Roman fort (1984), 3, 586–7Google Scholar; and Saalburg: Jacobi, L., Das Römerkastell Saalburg (1897), Taf. LXVII, 12.Google Scholar

14 Trett, , op. cit. (note 2), 220.Google Scholar

15 Pliny, , Nat. Hist. xiii, 18.Google Scholar

16 Martial, Epigr. xiv, 27.Google Scholar

17 G. Webster, op. cit. (note 8); Mann, J., ‘Some Roman military finds from Lincoln“, Archaeology in Lincoln 1982–3 (Oct. 1983), 33.Google Scholar

18 op. cit. (note 2), 57–8.Google Scholar

19 pers. comm. Valery Rigby.