Marisia - Maros Megyei Múzeum Évkönyve 31/1. (2011)
Articles
178 SZ. P. PÁNCZÉL The building is well-known as a pottery production site (Ciusescu 2004, 319-320) and it is also mentioned in relation to bone-working (Ciugudean 2001, 62; Vass 2010, 60), but until our research, it had never been identified as a glass workshop. From this building we have the largest concentration of moulds used for the production of prismatic glass bottles from the whole Roman Empire.6 In the two publications (Cserni 1912a; 1912b) illustrating the moulds (Pi. 1/6— 11) a total number of thirteen pieces has been originally published as ceiling-decorations. Based on the publications, we managed to re-identify seven of them in the collections of the National Museum of Unification (MNUAI) from Alba Iulia, but with regrets we had to realise that since the beginning of the 20th century six pieces belonging to the sides of the moulds were not to be found. In the same sequence of inventory numbers three unpublished moulds were identified in the museum, which have been probably recovered from room К (Fig. 3) excavated mainly in 1913 and until now their existence (Cserni 1913, 384) was only mentioned. Based on the description from the report published in 1913 (Cserni 1913, 384-385) we added to the plan of the building (Cserni 1912a, 259, fig. II) the eastern and southern walls of room К (Fig. 3 marked with grey). Fig. 3. The building excavated by B. Cserni. The glass moulds were found in a destruction layer in rooms F, G and I under the floor of the latest phase (Cserni 1912a, 278), so they cannot be linked to the last phase of the building. Data concerning the context of discovery of the moulds (5-6) and (10) discovered probably in room К in 1913 has not been published. Based on the numismatic evidence, the building seems to be in use already from the second quarter of the second century and at least until the middle of the third century (Cserni 1912a, 271-275), so our glass workshop should be rather dated to the late Antonine-early Severan period. 6 In 2006 a total number of sixteen moulds where known from the Roman Empire (Amrein-Nenna 2006, 495- 496; Sanchez de Prado 2006).
