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 - Bjelajac, L.: Late Roman glazed Pottery in Singidunum (Moesia I). p. 33–38.

A closer definition of the later group of ware has been provided by the material from the "federate" settlement in Donji Grad and a pit on the territory of the camp (Bjelajac - IvaniSevié 1991). The settlement layer at Donji Grad lies on a level of soot where 227 coins with the latest-dated emission of 375/78 were found, which represent a terminus post quern for the layer to be formed (Ivanisevic 1986, 44-58). Pits discovered in the camp included apart from pottery also a coin of Valentinianus II (376/392). The pottery mostly consist of gray ware with smoothed surface and polished ornaments. Apart from this pottery which is characteristic for the regions where Germanic tribes were included as federates in the new defense concept of the Empire, parallel discoveries of Roman provincial pottery have been made. Of glazed forms of this period the most common are mortaria (fig. 1/3, 5-7). Apart from shapes which do not differ from the mortaria of the older period (fig. 1/3) several new variants (fig. 1/57) are recorded. The dimensions of this ware are significantly smaller than before, white the glaze is still well-preserved, of olive color. Incised linear motifs appear more frequently as new features on the rims. Hemispherical bowls are mostly the same (fig. 2/1), while the number of types of plates increases compared to the earlier period (fig. 2/8-11). This group of ware includes also pots with three handles (fig. 3/3-4) and rare body fragments of jugs which cannot be typologically determined. Several pieces of ware described in this paper cannot be chronologically determined (figs. 1/8; 2/6; 3/1-2, 7). They have been included to provide a more comprehensive study of the range of forms, because they all originate from the layers more widely dated to the 4th century and have been found in various sites in Singidunum (BOJOVIC 1977, PI. XXIX/280, PI. XXX/28

1-289, PI. XLI/373, PI. XLV/426, PI. LII/472474, Pl. LXII/546-547). On the data obtained by the analysis of chronological and typological groups of glazed pottery from Singidunum, we may propose some conclusions which hopefully, will be of help for further research: - Massive occurrence and supposed glazed pottery manufacture in Singidunum may be dated to the 4th century. Research at this stage does not provide the means to date closely the beginning of the manufacture as Singidunum does not have positive stratigraphie layers with glazed pottery of the first decades of the 4th century, (some closely dated layers and pits from late 3rd and early 4th centuries contained no ware of this kind). The second third of the 4th century, can be considered, if not as the beginning, than certainly as the period of the greatest pottery production. The production continues into the second half of the 4th century and probably to the beginning of the 5 th century when it gradually decreases to its end. The 6th century layers in Singidunum have not been sufficiently investigated: they are either destroyed or mixed and it is now hard to say whether the glazed pottery production was represented here too, as at several other sites where it has been confirmed by finds (Jankovic 1983, 130-131; Bjelajac 1990, PI. XIII/2, PI. XIV/1415, 20, PI. XVI/18, PI. XVII/6-7, 15, Pl. XXI/2). We believe that the scale of production of the 6th century glazed pottery is certainly smaller and is limited to major centers, because some sites contain no glazed pottery in the 6th century layers (JANKOVIC 1981, 130161; Tomovié 1982-1983, 351-352; Popovié 1987, 137). - The range of glazed pottery forms of the 4th century is rather wide and it has not been presented completely in this paper because our first aim was to present ware from stratigraphically dated layers (BOJOVIC 1977, Pl. XXX/280-281, 285, Pl. XLI/426, Pl. LII/472). - The percentage of single groups of ware differs significantly. Most numerous in both older and later groups are mortaria (fig. 1/1-8), followed by hemispherical bowls (fig. 2/1-5). Other forms are represented by a far smaller number of items. - Some of the forms, like hemispherical bowls fig. 2/1-5 appear throughout the entire period of manufacture without major changes in their shape profiles. New forms of mortaria types are recorded only at the later stage of manufacture (fig. 1/5-7) along with some variants characteristic of the earlier period of manufacture (fig. 1/3). The results of Singidunum ware research reveal that jugs are most common in the earlier group of ware (fig. 3/5-6, 8), while pots with three handles appear only in the later group (fig. 3/3-4). The group of later manufactured ware also contained plates of several types and variants (fig. 2/8-11). Pots are generally scarce among glazed forms and not a single sherd could be found in the closed layers. - Quality and color of glaze are the same for all periods of manufacture. The basic color is olive with nuances ranging from green to brown. - All forms of glazed ware in the 4th century, with the exception of mortaria, also appear without glaze - with both coarse and polished surface. - The occurrence of this kind of ware and significant unification of forms and manufacture quality are characterized by numerous analogies, not only for the region of Moesia I, but also to other Danube provinces - Pannónia I and II, Valeria, Dacia Ripensis and Moesia II (Bonis 1991, 37-38, Abb.7; Gudea 1987, 409-436; Additional information related to Moesia I and the Yugoslav part of Dacia Ripensis is available in: Starinar 19821983; Cahiers des Portes de Fer 1984; Cahiers des Portes de Fer 1986; Cahiers des Portes de Fer 1987). 34