An early South Gaulish Terra Sigillata find complex from Brigantium/Bregenz (Austria)
An early South Gaulish Terra Sigillata find complex from Brigantium/Bregenz (Austria)
In 1913 a »Schatz seltener südgallischer Sigillaten« (treasure of rare South Gaulish sigillata) was uncovered in Bregenz, as one of the excavators, A. Hild, put it. The find complex consists of almost 400 burnt vessels and currently represents the largest deposit of South Gaulish terra sigillata of Tiberian to early Claudian date outside of the potteries of La Graufesenque.
The range of forms covers two decorated and 15 plain types (Drag. 11, Drag. 29, Halt. 1a, Drag. 17a, Drag. 17b, Drag. 17c, Drag. 17aR, Drag. 15/17, Drag. 15/17R, Drag. 16, Ritt. 1, Drag. 18, Ritt. 5, Drag. 24/25, Ritt. 8, Drag. 27 and Ritt. 12). In combination with the production dates of the 23 potters, which are documented by a total of 96 internal stamps, the deposit can be dated to the years around AD 40.
The following aspects argue against an interpretation of the finds as settlement rubbish: the chronologically homogeneous spectrum of forms and potters with the quantitative preponderance of single types (especially Drag. 24/25, Ritt. 8), the existence of identical stamp types in combination with a distinct dominance of one potter (Cantus), the high degree of preservation of the vessels, the total absence of Italian sigillata and the largely missing explicit traces of use. The find complex can rather be assigned to the category of the »pre-consumption deposits« and thus represents a depot of unused vessels destroyed by a fire.
The context in which the finds were originally stored and finally discarded cannot be evaluated, since no stratigraphically connected features have been excavated. Due to the position of the find spot within a military fort abandoned in AD 44/45, the original function of the assemblage has to be set in the context of this installation. Therefore, it is quite likely that the find complex »Bregenz 1913« constitutes the rest of one of the few pottery stores within a military post known so far.
Publication:
- J. Kopf, Ein früher südgallischer Terra-Sigillata-Sammelfund aus Bregenz: Überrest eines militärischen Keramikdepots? Jahrb. RGZM 62, 2015 (2020), 135–254. https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/jahrb-rgzm/article/view/77137/71009.