Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. Az István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 25. – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (1995)

Rei Cretariae Romanae Fautorum Acta XXXIV - cvjetićanin, T.: Late Roman glazed Pottery from the Iron Gate Region (Dacia Ripensis). p. 27–32.

Alba Regia, XXV, 1994 T. CVJETICANIN LATE ROMAN GLAZED POTTERY FROM THE IRON GATE REGION (DACIA RIPENSIS) The iron Gate region (Eastern Serbia) is an inexhaustible source of precious archaeological data for understanding different aspects and phenomena of the past, especially Roman civilization.

05 One of those, so far insufficiently studied, phenomena is the problem of Late Roman glazed pottery. Regardless of its amount, distribution, frequency and variety, this pottery is hardly ever investigated, and there are few works in which findplaces in this area are mentioned. The Iron Gate region - the Serbian part of the Middle Danube border of the former province of Dacia Ripensis (Fig. 1), established by administrative reform at the end of the 3rd century - includes the Danube right-bank zone from the mouth of the Porec River to the mouth of the Timok River (Fig. 2). There are 19 sites with clearly definite Late Roman layers excavated in this area (Fig. 3) covering a time span from the beginning of the last quarter of the 3rd century (establishing the Province) to the middle of the 5th century (disintegration of the limessystem due to devastation by the Huns). Based on archaeological researches, it is possible to distinguish several periods marked by well known historical events: A - the last quarter of the 3rd and the beginning of the 4th century; В - the second and the third quarter of the 4th century; С - the last quarter of the 4th and the first quarter of the 5th century, D - the second quarter of the 5th century .

(2) Glazed ceramics

(3) were found on almost every Late Roman site, during all mentioned periods. Glazed pottery is an obvious, clear, recognizable feature of the Late Roman layers in this part of the fortified Roman frontier, so it seems that its study could be very wortwhile and could contribute to the question of the revival of glazed ceramics in provinces of the Late Roman period. In this paper we are going to present its basic characteristics. 1. New excavations in the Iron Gate region have shown that in the Late Roman ceramic material

(4) (Jankovic 1973/74; JANKOVIC 1981; Tomovic 1982/3; Garasanin(Vasic)-Marjanovié-Vujovié 1984; Jevremovic 1987; Cvjetiéanin, in press) the quantity of glazed wares is, from nearly all sites, greater than supposed in the literature (Gudea 1987; Gudea 1990). Unfortunately, pottery from four sites (Fig. 3/2, 3, 15, 18) was not available to the author. On only two (Fig. 3/7, 9b) of the other 15 finding places was glazed material not recorded. Some of the sites, such as the fortress Donje Butorke (Fig. 3/9a), have even 48,4 % of glazed pottery in recorded ceramics from the second half of the 4th century. Tekija (Fig. 3/6), on the other hand, during the first half of the 4th century, has the smallest amount of glazed wares - only 4,25 %. In total, glazed pottery in layers of period A makes up 3,4 % of typologically identifiable material; in period В it Large archaeological researches were held in last three decades. Preliminary reports are published in ARCHEOLOSKIPREGLED, for the period 1961-1974 (sites between the mouth of the Porec river and Sip), and in DJERDAPSKE SVESKE, for the period since 1978 (sites between Karatas and Radujevac). A special volume of STARINAR, number XXXIII-XXXIV, 1982/83, is dedicated to the excavations of this region. Glazed pottery is not common during this period. New types could not be recognized and in usage was only a small quantity of bowls, plates and jugs typical for period C. (3) (4) By the term „ceramis" I understand only wares used in preparing, serving and storing food and liquids, that is so-called kitchen- tableand storage-ware. The complete Late Roman and Early Byzantine available pottery, more that 17000 vessels, has been studied (Ceramics of the Yugoslav Part of the Province of Dacia Ripensis, author's M.A. thesis, in press), and this paper is one of the results of this research-work. Analysis has not been done on atypical fragments like bases, handles and body sherds. 27