The source of raw materials for Roman pottery from Leptiminus, Tunisia

Abstract

Leptiminus, a Roman port city on the west coast of Tunisia, North Africa, exported olive oil and a garum fish paste to Rome. Excavations have uncovered many facilities including kilns and a potter's workshop, indicating an extensive ceramic industry. The vessels, manufactured at Leptiminus, included African red‐slip fineware, coarseware, and amphorae. A petrographic study of pottery sherds showed them to contain very similar temper, rounded aeolian sand grains and limestone, but varying in proportions to produce different textures. An investigation of the source of raw materials for the pottery found three distinct types of clay within a 50 km radius of Leptiminus: grey Miocene, brown Pliocene, and green Late Pliocene clay. Statistical analysis of trace element compositions, using induced neutron activation, of clays and sherds showed that the Pliocene brown clay was used to create all types of pottery. The specific clay horizon, used in Roman times, has apparently been removed by quarrying. However, a lateral continuation of this bed was found 7 m beneath the Leptiminus site 290. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Pottery production, regional exchange, and state collapse during the Middle Horizon (A.D.500–1000): LA-ICP-MS analyses of Tiwanaku pottery in the Moquegua Valley, Peru

“…Using the ''Criterion of Abundance'' those ceramics that are chemically distinct from the majority are assumed to be imports (Bishop et al 1982: 300-301). However, several studies have sought to empirically connect finished ceramic vessels with the area in which they were produced by attempting to locate clays and compare their chemical signatures with those of archaeological ceramics (Adan-Bayewitz and Perlman 1985; Bartlett et al 2000;Dorais et al 2004;Hein et al 2004;Neff et al 1992;Phillips and Morgenstein 2002;Sharratt et al 2009;Sherriff et al 2002;Strazicich 1998;Vaughn and Neff 2004). Such comparisons are not straightforward.…”

Archaeometric Characterization of Amphorae from the Late Antique City ofEmporiae(Catalonia, Spain)

“…Recent petrographic studies (Bonifay et al 2002(Bonifay et al , 2010a(Bonifay et al , 2011Sherriff et al 2002;Capelli 2005aCapelli ,b, 2007Ghalia et al 2005;Capelli et al 2006;Capelli and Bonifay 2007;Gandolfi In contrast, there is a general scarcity of chemical analyses on these production centres, apart from a few-mainly unpublished-early studies (Liddy 1985;Taylor 1993;Taylor et al 1997;Sherriff et al 2002) that have not been continued in recent years. From the chemical-petrographic information obtained in this study and its comparison to the information available from different workshops, along with the typological evidence, a provenance hypothesis can be proposed for most of the analysed samples (Table 3).…”

A Mössbauer study of the color of Roman pottery from the Leptiminus archaeological site, Tunisia

“…Polished thin sections of all samples were prepared for optical analysis using a conventional light microscope, and all sherds showed a uniform texture and mineralogy with temper clasts of quartz, calcite, and grog, identical to that described by Sherriff et al (2002).…”