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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 November 2011
Among the finds in the site museum at Corbridge are two related silvered ZA bronze mirrors. Although there are no details about the precise find spot, they can be paralleled by a number of mirrors found mainly in the region of the Lower Rhine, and by several undecorated examples from excavations in England. The first piece is a large fragment of an almost plain disc (PL. XVIII A), slightly convex on its reflecting side and with a narrow slightly convex border on the under side, marked off from the body of the mirror by a single engraved line 0·8 cm from the edge. The fragment measures 7·6 by 6·0 cm; the original diameter would have been about 9·8 cm.
* I would like to thank the Directors and staff of all museums who gave me permission to study and refer to their mirrors. Without their help and co-operation the initial research for this paper could not have been completed. Final research for this note was carried out whilst holding a scholarship from the Netherlands Ministry of Education and Science (International Relations Department). The first draft was read by Dr D. J. Smith, Keeper of the Museum of Antiquities, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and Curator of the Corbridge site museum. It was also read by the late Miss M. H. P. den Boesterd of Rijksmuseum G.M. Kam, and Dr P. Stuart of the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden te Leiden, who offered many useful suggestions and criticisms. Any opinions or errors are mine alone. I would like to thank both Dr Stuart and Dr A. V. M. Hubrecht, Director of Rijksmuseum Kam, for their unfailing encouragement and hospitality during frequent and extended visits to their museums. Finally, thanks are due to my tutors in the University of Birmingham for help and guidance over many years. The reconstructiondrawings were prepared with the help of Mr Peter Alebon of the Grosvenor Musum, Chester.
1 A related group W, with handles across the back, includes the Simpelveld mirror from the celebrated sarcophagus, now in the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden te Leiden (No. e 1930/12.8), and more distantly, the Wroxeter mirror in subgroup Wa, now in Clive House Museum, Shrewsbury (Atkinson, D., Report on Excavations at Wroxeter 1923–27 (Oxford 1942, reprinted 1970), 196–8, pl. 46)Google Scholar.
2 Newstead, R., Liverpool Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology 8, no. 2 (1921), 50–51Google Scholar, grave 30, diam. 9.0 cm, silvered bronze; now in the Grosvenor Museum, Chester.
3 67 0277. From St Albans, area SUAD Burial 4, Dr Ian Stead's excavations, at present in the Department of the Environment.
4 Noordbrabantsmuseum, 's Hertogenbosch No. 494 I, 2·6 by 3·6 cm, diameter originally c. 9·3 cm, silvered bronze.
5 Said to have come from a cremation grave in the cemetery of Kastell Pförring.
6 15911, diam. 12·8 cm, silvered bronze; 15913, diam. 9·6 cm, silvered bronze; both in the Museo Archeologico, Aquileia: Antiquarium, Capitoline Museums, Rome, No. 16231, diam. 10·4 cm, described as ‘bronze and antimony’.
7 Arheološki Muzej, Zagreb, No. 4514, diam. 102 cm. Another fragment in the same museum, No. 4516 also from Siscia still has discernible traces of one hatched ray and a dot-and-circle pattern over intersecting semicircles.
8 Museo Civico e Gallerie d'Arte Antica, Udine, No. 1139, incomplete, diam. 11·4 cm.
9 diam. c. 9 cm, not located. Behrens, G., Mainzer Zeitschrift, 12/13 (1917–1918), 30Google Scholar, Abb. II.14, No. 41.
10 From the old City Library Collection, now in the Stadtisches Museum für Vorund Frühgeschichte, Frankfurt a.M., No. zu x 3535 a. u. b., diam. 9-8 cm, silvered bronze.
11 Bronze Room III, Vatican Museum, No. 12283.
12 Institute of Archaeology, University of Nijmegen, unnumbered, 1·76 by 1·7 cm, probably silvered bronze.
13 XXI.f/Xc.6, 2·2 by 3·8 cm, silvered bronze.
14 Villefosse, A. Heron de, ‘Le Trésor de Boscoreale’, Mon. Plot. 5 (1899), No. 21, 88–90Google Scholar, pl. xix, fig. 20, 47; No. 22, 90–92, pl. xx; No. 98, 128, fig. 45; Maiuri, A., La Casa del Menandro (Rome 1932), No. 15, 15, 350, fig. 135–6Google Scholar, pl. XLVII–XLIII; NO. I6, 353, pl. LXI; NO. 4709, 452.
15 For example, Musee Archeologique, Nitnes, No. 908.51.61.1 and 2 unprovenanced; Musee de la Civilisation gallo romaine, Lyons, No. L 137, from Vaison la Romaine.
16 Rijksmuseum G.M. Kam No. B. E. II. 9 and 16, both formerly in the Municipal collection. The former comes from the Hunerberg, the latter from excavations behind the Catholic church on Koolemans Beinenstraat, Nijmegen, 1905. Further evidence for a first-century origin for the group is given by the recent discovery of another mirror in Grave 390 at Cambodunum/Kempten. It has been described as Vespasianic in date. I am most grateful to Mr Michael Mackensen, Munich, for this information (Jan. 1976).
17 For example, Brunsting, H., ‘Het Grafveld onder Hees bij Nijmegen’, Allard Plerson Stichting Archaeologische-Historische Bijdragen 4 (1937), 28Google Scholar, 191, Grave 42 No. 4, pl. 12, inv. no. B. E. II. 29; Rijksmuseum van Oudheden te Leiden No. e 1906/5.188 also from Hees, Nijmegen.