years B.C. 9 and A.D. 10. In Hofheim,[1] also to the north of the Rhine, the finds date from the reigns of Claudius and Nero, covering the twenty years between A.D. 40 and A.D. 60. Again, Pompeii, destroyed in A.D. 79, gives us another fixed point of great value. The legionary fortresses of Vindonissa and Novaesium likewise furnish us with types dating from the first century, and many of the Limes forts—Sulz and Gnotzheim, for example—have their beginnings in the time of Vespasian or Domitian, while the early occupations of others, such as the Saalburg and Zugmantel, may belong rather to the reigns of Trajan and of Hadrian. The shards gathered from these various sites comprise examples that must have issued from the potteries of Arezzo and from the factories of Southern Gaul, as well as from the workshops of the later craftsmen on the Rhine. In this material, carefully studied and classified by Dragendorff, Ritterling, Koenen, and others in Germany, and by Déchelette in France, we have our best guide to a proper understanding of the corresponding objects from Newstead.
Terra Sigillata
At Newstead the brightly glazed red earthenware, often called 'Samian,' bulked largely. Of all the pottery which the Romans brought with them it illustrates best the homogeneous nature of their civilisation, and of their methods and art of decoration. Older antiquaries saw in it the red ware of Samos mentioned by Pliny, but the epithet 'Samian' is as much of a misnomer as our own 'china,' and the ware is now frequently termed Terra Sigillata (sealed clay), especially on the Continent—a name devised to describe the fine red material from which it is manufactured. Its chief characteristics are its bright colour, its fine glaze, and the raised decoration applied to certain of its types. It must have been employed, much as we use china, for the finer dishes for table service.
Terra Sigillata was of foreign origin.[2] We have no evidence that it was ever manufactured in Britain. It seems clear that it was first made in Greek lands and later in the potteries of Arezzo. These potteries appear to have been in operation as early as the second century B.C., and they probably reached the height of their prosperity in the following century. Thereafter they declined in importance, although they were still celebrated in the first century of the Christian era. At first they appear to have produced vases with a black glaze, but this soon gave place to a red coralline colour. The pieces
1 Ritterling, Das frührömische Lager bei Hofheim, p. 23.
2 For the facts contained in this outline of the history of Terra Sigillata I must express my indebtedness to the work of M. Déchelette; Les vases céramiques ornés de la Gaule romaine, 2 Vols. Paris, 1904.
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