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Snake-thread Glasses found in the East

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

D. B. Harden
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Extract

Perhaps the most remarkable product of Rhenish glass-furnaces during the Imperial period is the well-known fabric bearing polychrome or monochrome applied decoration. These are the glasses termed by German archaeologists ‘Schlangenfaden’ or ‘snake-thread’ glass. They are of various shapes and were produced in great numbers from the last quarter of the second to the fourth century A.D., probably largely, if not entirely, at Cologne.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 24 , Issue 1 , 1934 , pp. 50 - 55
Copyright
Copyright © D. B. Harden 1934. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Compare Kisa, A., Das Glas im Altertume, pp. 446–70 and figs. 113–130Google Scholar: Morin-Jean, , La Verrerie en Gaule sous l'empire romain, pp. 199–216 and figs. 271–293Google Scholar: Fremersdorf, F., Römische Gläser aus Köln (Studien aus den Kölner Kunstsammlungen vii), pp. 7–8Google Scholar and figs. 19–22: Lehner, H., Provinzialmuseum in Bonn, Führer I2, p. 74Google Scholar and pl. xvi, 2: (S. Loescheke) Sammlung Niessen, Cöln, 1911, pp. 13–15, pls. ix–xi. The commonest shapes are ovoid and cylindrical jugs, trullae or casseroles, flasks on base-rings or stems, deep bowls, tall beakers, and carchesia or drinking cups.

2 Cesnola, op. cit., pl. iii; figured in Harden, op. cit. This vase is now in the British Museum, bought with the Cesnola Coll. in 1876.

3 C. C. Edgar, ‘Graeco-Egyptian Glass,’ Cat. gen. Mus. du Caire, no. 32754, pl. x.

4 Harden, op. cit., no. 637 and figure.

5 Compare, e.g., Fremersdorf, Röm. Gläser, fig. 19 (an example with concavities in the body, as no. I, 2): Kisa, Das Glas, fig. 114b, 115b, 122, 146; Lehner, op. cit., pl. xvi, 2. All these are snake-thread glasses. In the Vom Rath collection now in the Antiquarium, Berlin (Kisa, op. cit., fig. 97e), is a similar vase with horizontal wheel-incisions on the body.

6 Fremersdorf, , Arch. Anz., 1931, 1/2, p. 144Google Scholar, quoting Festus.

7 Fremersdorf, op. cit., pp. 147–8, only quotes two instances.

8 Figured in Harden, Rom. Glass from Karanis.

9 The examples from Kish are to be published in a forthcoming number of Iraq.

10 Harden, Rom. Glass from Karanis, no. 491 and figure.

11 Compare, e.g., Kisa, Das Glas, fig. 114d, 123, 129; Morin-Jean, Verrerie, p. 136 and fig. 292; Niessen Cat., p. 14, nos. 120–2, pls. xi and xxv.

12 Unfortunately both the fragments are insufficient to tell us what the general design on the goblets was like.

13 Harden, op. cit. The ware is fabric 2 in Harden's list.

14 This is the view of Fremersdorf, , Arch. Anz., 1931, 1/2, p. 148Google Scholar.