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Description: | Incomplete Roman copper alloy object, possibly a cosmetic mortar. When viewed in profile, the body of the object is trapezoidal in shape and does not taper to either end. It has a broad V shaped section. It is damaged to either end, but appears more or less complete, suggesting that there was not a suspension loop or any form of decorative terminals. To the underneath of the object are two pointed knops, set 12.7mm apart and slightly bent in towards one another. The object is 37.3mm long, 12.7mm wide, 10.54mm high (not including the knops) and weighs 10.02g. The original surface is missing and the object is much abraded, exposed surfaces are now mid green. Break edges are worn suggesting damage occurred in antiquity.
The object does not have any parallels in Jackson?s cosmetic set typology (Jackson, 1985, Cosmetic sets from Late Iron Age and Roman Britain, Britannia 16, 165-193). However, it clearly shares the appearance of a cosmetic mortar, with the V shaped section typical of these objects and could conceivably be used for grinding. It is possible that the knops are the remains of a broad loop to the underside, which is not unknown (see figure 8, number 72), though the knops are too worn to suggest if they did form part of a loop, or are in fact complete as they stand. It should also be noted that the object appears shorter and more ?squat? than most mortars, though anomalous examples of mortars do occasionally appear (figure 8, numbers 98 & 99).
The object is from a site producing other Late Iron Age and Roman material, so the date of the object is likely to be within that period, however, without a good cosmetic mortar parallel, the object may be an entirely unknown other object. | Format: | text/html | License: | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ | Publisher: | The Portable Antiquities Scheme | Rights holder: | The Portable Antiquities Scheme | Subjects: | archaeology | Temporal: | -100
410 | Source: | Portable Antiquities | Creator: | Caroline McDonald | Identifier: | http://www.finds.org.uk/database/artefac... | Language: | en-GB | Format: | text/html | Go to resource |
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