Note on two 1st century AD glass vessels from London Michael Marshall Museum of London Archaeology mmarshall@mola.org.uk Introduction This note directs readers attention to two interesting Roman glass vessels dating to the first century AD recovered during a watching brief at the junction of Cheapside and Old Jewry in the City of London (Sitecode: JWR11). The work was undertaken by Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) for the City of London Department of Planning and Transportation1. A total of 7 sherds of glass were recovered, two yellow-brown and four naturally coloured blue-green, but only the sherds comprising the two vessels reported here could be identified to form. The glass was found together with a large assemblage of pottery which provides a relatively tight Late Neronian – Early Flavian date, c AD 60/1 – 75, and this is consistent with the dating of the glass. It is also possible that this dumped material is related to a substantial early Flavian stone building, part of which was discovered c 15m to the south during excavations by MOLA on the adjacent site at No 1 Poultry (Hill and Rowsome 2011, 90-93, fig 82, B18/48). The Vessels Glass cup (fig 1) Accession 4, Context 15 Free blown yellow-brown vessel, probably a cup. Upright fire rounded rim with a horizontal opaque white marvered trail and a figure of eight neck fold above a convex body. Rim diameter 64mm. Glass belonging to this tradition of strongly coloured vessels, sometimes with opaque decoration in another colour, dates to the early – mid 1st century AD and thus tends to be of Claudio-Neronian date in Britain (Cool and Price 1995, 56-60). The overall distribution of these vessels suggests they may have been manufactured within the region encompassing northern Italy, southern France, Switzerland and Austria (ibid, 56). This form has not previously been recorded from London and both the figure of eight neck fold and the white rim trail are quite unusual in Britain. However, these two decorative traits are combined elsewhere on 1st century blue glass vessels of somewhat different form with inturned rims found at Vindonissa, Switzerland (Berger 1960, 82, no 210) and at Fréjus, France (Cottam and Price 2009, 205, no. 155) . 1 Summaries of the watching brief are available (Daykin 2012; Maloney 2012, 53) and a more detailed / discursive account of the finds from the watching brief and their significance is to be published elsewhere (Marshall and Thorp in prep). Glass cup (fig 2) Accessions 1-3, Context 15 Mould blown natural blue-green ovoid gladiator cup. Three fragments from the lower part of the body. Rather narrow base. Base diameter c 40mm The surviving section has a pelleted border across the top and is divided in half by two vertical mould seams. Decoration in each half comprises a pair of gladiators with interposed palm leaves. In the best preserved half the two gladiators are almost complete and the remnants of their names can be read as […]V[…]VS and BVRD[O]. Burdo turns away and raises his hand in a gesture of capitulation. Judging by the visible equipment this is the classic pairing of the murmillo vs thraex classes of gladiators. Enough remains of the other half to show that the figure on the right is facing away from his opponent2 and he may be grasping a palm leaf but the names and the class of the gladiators is obscure. Ovoid cups date to around the third quarter of the first century AD (Price and Cottam 1998, 61-3). They are rare in London with only 4 of the 39 mould blown cups from the city attributable to this form and this seems to bear out a wider pattern whereby cylindrical cups are more common than the oval examples. The relative proportions vary, however, in different parts of the Empire perhaps reflecting differences in supply (Sennequier et al 1998, 78-9). This example does not appear to conform to any of the moulds groups defined by Sennequier et al (ibid, 24-76) and I would be very interested to hear of other instances of cups from this mould or any other which depicts the gladiator Burdo. Acknowledgements Professor Jennifer Price was kind enough to comment on the glass and offered some very useful references. Thanks are also due to Dr Roger Tomlin for his reading of Burdo’s name. I am also grateful to colleagues at MOLA for their work on the project and for permission to provide details and images of the vessels here. The watching brief was carried out by Andy Daykin and the project was managed by Julian Hill and David Divers. Amy Thorp reported on the pottery from the site and her dates are cited above. The illustrations are by Daniel Bashford and the photograph is by Andy Chopping. 2 Who may have fallen to the ground References 1. Berger, L. 1960, Römische Gläser aus Vindonissa Veröffentlichungen Gessellschaft pro Vindonissa Basel 2. Cool, H.E.M. and Price, J. 1995, Roman vessel glass from excavations in Colchester 1971-85. Colchester Archaeol Rep 8 3. Cottam, S and J Price ‘The early Roman vessel glass’ in Ch. Goudineau and D Brentchaloff, Le Camp de la Flotte d’Agrippa a Fréjus. Paris, editions Errance (2009), 205, no 155 4. Daykin, A 2012, Old Jewry Dropshafts, London, EC2, City of London, Unpublished Watching Brief report 5. Hill, J. and Rowsome, P. 2011, Roman London and the Walbrook stream crossing: Excavations at 1 Poultry and vicinity MOLA Monograph 37 6. Maloney, C. 2012 London Fieldwork and Publication Round-up 2011, London Archaeologist 13, supplement 2 (2012), 53 7. Marshall, M. and Thorp A. (in prep) ‘Three Roman vessels from Old Jewry / Cheapside, London, EC 2’ submitted to London Archaeologist 8. Price, J. and Cottam, S. 1998, Roman-British Glass Vessel: A Handbook CBA Practical Handbook in Archaeology 14 9. Sennequier, G. Hochuli-Gysel, A. Fünfschiling, S. Berger, L. Nelis-Clément, J. and Landes, C. 1998, Les verres romains à scènes de spectacle trouvés en France association française pour l’archaéologie du verre Fig 1. Yellow-brown cup with opaque white rim trail. Fig 2. Naturally coloured blue-green mould blown cup with gladiator decoration.