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Glassmaking and glassworking in the roman and early Christian world : glassworking activity in Thessaloniki

• Αντωνάρας, Αναστάσιος

The making of glass from raw materials (glassmaking), and the making of objects from readymade glass (glassworking), presented two distinct processes in ancient and medieval glassworking, which took place at different locations and times. During the Roman and Early Byzantine periods, primary glass production appears to have taken place only in certain workshops with specific construction and operation, examples of which have to date been uncovered only in Israel and Egypt.Glassworking workshops, which were occupied in secondary production, viz. the creation of objects from reheated glass produced in another workshop, were small production units normally established on the perimeter of cities to avoid the hazard of fires as well as the disturbance of neighbours. However, abandoned public spaces and buildings were often used to house them, and it appears that such workshops operated around army camps to serve the needs of the military. It has also been observed that glassworkers were frequently active in the immediate vicinity of, or shared their quarters with, other artisans who also required production furnaces, such as metalworkers and potters.Glassworking workshops were very simple constructions whose only requisite furnishing was a furnace, in which the glass was heated in a crucible; in connection with this an annealing oven is often found as well. Sometimes the marble surface for marvering is also found. Molds or actual glassblowing pipes have been discovered only in rare cases. The glass came partly from glass chunks purchased commercially and partly from the recycling of cullets coming from the surrounding area. Due to continuous recycling, the volume of remainders from the workshop activity of glassworkers was small, consisting chiefly of test droplets, cracked-off pieces of glass or glass cullets, moils, and excess.Excavation evidence from Thessaloniki documents the activity of glassworkers in this city. Though there is no immovable evidence that would show the exact arrangement of glassworks, they nevertheless provide sufficient indications to make it certain that there were at least three workshops operating in the city during the 4th, 5th, and 6th centuries. These movable workshop remains have been found in piecemeal form; some were connected with the city’s cemeteries, where various artisans were active, like a point in the Eastern cemetery where the University of Thessaloniki’s Theological School was built, and others with public urban spaces which in Late Antiquity lost their original function and were taken over by various specialties of craftsmen-artisans, such as the large bath complex atop part of which the basilica of Acheiropoiitos was built, or the Ancient Agora.In the area of the bath complex east of Acheiropoiitos were uncovered workshop remains, parts of a glassworking furnace and a clay crucible, an iron spatula and a fragment of a vase of the 4th-5th century. The period during which the wo rkshop was in operation cannot be determined with precision, since the archaeological data from the excavation are not accurately known. It is probable that it operated during the 5th century, a period slightly before the construction of the basilica, making use of the temporarily abandoned space in the baths, or in the mid-5th century, during the building phase, temporarily meeting the needs of the construction project. However, one cannot exclude the possibility that the finds were transported and dumped at the point where they were discovered from some other site that would in any case have been nearby.In Thessaloniki’s Ancient Agora area, among other remains from artisans’ establishments, there were also discovered remains from glassworking activity. These included parts of a furnace, cracked-off pieces of glass, and test droplets from the mass of glass that was being worked. As regards the dating of these also discovered remains from glassworking activity. These included pa rts of a furnace, cracked-off pieces of glass, and test droplets from the mass of glass that was being worked. As regards the dating of these glassworking factory remains, there is no particular evidence beyond the general chronological framework of the late 4th to early 6th century, a period when craftsmen were active in this area.In the area excavated for the construction of the University of Thessaloniki’s Theological School, among and atop graves there was discovered an Early Byzantine building for professional use near which it appears there was a workshop for production of clay lamps. Remains of glassworking activity have also come from the same excavation site: parts of a furnace, test droplets, deformed glass cullets, and wasters. Based on the finds, this glassworking workshop produced mainly lamps. The likely period of the workshop's operation is fixed between the second half of the 3rd and the first half of the 6th century, with the most likely period of operation in the 5th or first half of the 6th century, as both the glassworking remains and the numismatic evidence reveal.

• History and Archaeology

• Αρχαιολογία
• Archaeology and art
• Decorative arts

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