Relief Bowl 'Theatre Masks' from Clay, Terra Sigillata

Relief Bowl 'Theatre Masks' from Clay, Terra Sigillata

This bowl has been handcrafted in Germany in long and complex procedures and shows an enjoyable contrast to many of the imported and machine-made products on the market. The quality, the accuracy and the pleasure of traditional manufacturing and replicating true-to-original pieces are visible and convincing.

The raw material of this high-quality product is the clay, which is mined in Germany (in the surroundings of Rheinzabern) and mixed with slip from washing pits already laid out by the Romans. The clay is prepared the ancient Roman way, without the use of filter presses. It is then thrown on the potter's wheel and either free-formed or turned into standardised shapes using pottery moulds. When leather-hard, the free-formed pieces are provided with their typical decorations.

This type of picture bowls were used from the second half of the 2nd c. well into the 3rd c. AD, not only for serving and storing food but also as mixing vessels for wine and water.

Details:
- Height: approx. 13 cm
- Weight: approx. 1.25 kg
- Circumference at widest part: approx. 77 cm

Terra Sigillata
Terra Sigillata ("sealed earth"/ "clay bearing little images") is high-class tableware with a red, silky, shiny surface. Beside silver and bronze, this fine pottery was the most representative crockery. In Roman times, the yearly production amounted to over a million pieces, which were exported to Germania Libera, Britannia and even as far as the Black Sea. Archaeologists get valuable knowledge about the opulence of forms and decorations of the crockery and about the names of the potters, who sometimes stamped their works, out of the vessels that couldn't stand the quality check and were thrown into the rubbish pits.

Smooth Sigillata
These items were basically formed without any decoration.

Chip carving Sigillata
The embellishments were carved with various cutting tools into the leather-hard surface.

Sigillata with Barbotine paintings
Slip decoration was painted onto the leather-hard clay surface with a small slip trailer.

Relief Sigillata
Relief Sigillata were rotated in biscuit-fired, porous moulds fixed on the potter's wheel.

Rough pottery
These vessels (for example mortaria) differ from the Sigillata ware. The clay used here has a corser grain and the vessels are fired without high-gloss slip.