Mária T. Biró: The Bone Objects of the Roman Collection. (Catalogi Musei Nationalis Hungarici. Seria Archeologica 2; Budapest, 1994)
INTRODUCTION - 2. The technical process of bone carving
2. The technical process of bone carving The development of any branch of handicraft, their way from individual pieces to mass production is limited by the features of the raw material and by the technical possibilities of multiplying. The work of bone carvers was mechanized with the employment of lathe. The employment of lathe made, on the other hand, serial production possible. This tool was suitable both for finishing the whole planned object and for the decoration of the ready piece. The decoration on the surface of the carvings could be done with a chisel reminding one of compasses resp. with a set of such chisels. The distance between the two legs of this iron tool determined the radius of the incised dot circles. One workshop used at least three sizes of such chisel compasses. 4 With these tools various motifs could be constructed; the circle could be placed beside each other in geometric formations, or within each other (from one centre two-three-four circles were drawn) or with the connecting of reverse semi-circles undulating lines of certain rhythm could be composed. The employment of both lathe and chisel compasses have detached the ancient craft of bone carving from its artistic roots and from the magic of individual creating. This break may had not only technical causes but also those of aspect. Artistic creation and serial production were definitely separated. The servile copying of the prototypes to be found in pattern books satisfied the demands of market to such a degree that in the western part of the Empire there are no traces of the existence of popular bone carving art and craft. Let us remember of the pipes, drinking bowls carved of bone by Hungarian shepherds or country people. These reflect the people, the animals and the surrounding in which bone and wood carving people lived with the colourfulness of story books. This sort of naive, folk art did not exist in Roman provinces. The cause of this lack was not the shortage of manual skill or phantasy by people but the ampleness of devices of everyday life easily accessible for anybody; just like the folk art of our days is worn away by the mass of cheap machine-made products, not to speak of the circumstance that bone itself as a raw material was substituted by plastics. Except for ivory objects of high artistic value (e. g. diptychs, caskets) there are no individual pieces in the provinces. The same shapes and decorations are copied with more or less success. In the course of production the character of the ready end product is not so much determined by the tools than primarily by the raw material itself. Bone carving industry is also bound by the plasticity, size and solidity of its raw material. Ivory was brought into the Empire as raw material; there was no demand for carved ivory — for the artistic carvings of the East — because of the great difference in taste. There are only two or three such carvings known (Pompeian dancer, 5 the comb from Gorsium 6 ) as opposed to the fine pieces corresponding to classical taste and representations of GraecoRoman mythology carved in ivory. In the provinces the raw material of local industry was antlers, tusk of wild boar or ox-horn. Generally the bone of younger animals was preferred because from these lighter coloured pieces could be carved. The raw material determined also the maximum size of objects to be made. Dice boxes were made of two pieces, flutes of two or three parts. The head of certain large pins is often made of separate head and leg. Fitting together was so masterfully solved that they are unperceivable. The objects were attached together without sticking only with turning; the fitting together of miniature bores and pegs is almost invisible. Bracelets and combs were fastened with bronze, more seldom with iron rivets. With bracelets the place of planned attaching was denoted with an X. First the dot-circle motifs were carved into the objects. Then the borders were drawn whether they were combs or bracelets. These border lines always cross the circles. There are some lucky chances when the trace of paint rubbed into the circles has remained. 7 It is probable that a part of bone carvings were painted. The traces of paint could be seen on several bracelets from Tác as well, and also on a small decorative comb in the Collection of the Hungarian National Museum. Bone objects were often not only coloured but could be decorated with ribbons or chains, as seen from the traces of holes which could have no structural function whatever (e. g. the pins with cock). The surface of bone objects was decorated with three characteristic techniques. Dot-circle technique. The most usual was the pattern of circles carved with the fixed chisel compasses. With one central point one-two or three circles could be drawn at once. In
