Roman teapot with ribs

The glass bowl decorated with ribs is a vessel made of clear glass in a Roman workshop. It was an element of furnishings of an inhumation grave covered with stone pavement, found together with another, almost identical glass vessel of slightly larger dimensions, which is also in the collection of the Szczecin Museum. The burial in Kosin, Pyrzyce poviat, was discovered by accident in April 1883. The archives do not contain any conclusive information about the grave’s furnishings. What is certain, is that apart from two glass vessels, it also contained a Roman bronze saucepan, featuring (according to some sources) the inscription PCIPIPOLIB, a fragment of another bronze vessel, and possibly a wooden bucket with metal fittings. The glass bowls from Kosin are dated to the Roman period, the 2nd half of the 1st century. They represent the design that was widespread in the ancient world and the area of Barbaricum. Such vessels were manufactured in glass workshops in the eastern part of the Mediterranean basin. The grave from Kosin, next to the “princely grave” with an analogous vessel from the cemetery in Lubieszewo, Gryfice poviat, is an example of grand burials of tribal elites, which developed in the societies of Western Pomerania during the Roman period. Access to imported Roman glass and bronze vessels was one of the essential attributes of these elites. The cultural identification of the burial from Kosin is problematic. The funerary rites generally correspond to the tradition of the Wielbark culture. However, some researchers distinguish the so-called “Pyrzyce cluster” (group), which exhibits, apart from the stylistics of the Wielbark culture, also strong influences from the area of the Elbe region.

Bartłomiej Rogalski