Early Roman Mosaic Materials in Southern Britain, J.R.L, Allen, M.G, Fulford

Early Roman Mosaic Materials in Southern Britain, with Particular Reference to Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum): A Regional Geological Perspective
Author(s): J. R. L. Allen and M. G. Fulford Source: Britannia, Vol. 35 (2004), pp. 9-38 Published by: Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4128620 Accessed: 06/12/2008 10:42
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Early
Roman
Mosaic
Materials with Particular Silchester
in
Southern
Britain,
to
Reference
a
(Calleva A trebatum): Regional Geological Perspective

By J.R.L. ALLEN and M.G. FULFORD With a Palaeontological Note by J.A. Todd and N.J. Morris
INTRODUCTION
been extensively studied, and corpora have been assembled for certain provinces of the Empire.' In Britain, the study of the surviving mosaics has led to the identification of certain late Roman 'schools' (stylistic groupings) of mosaics on the basis of shared stylistic attributes.2Now it will be possible to place this work in a fuller context as the long-awaited corpus of all Roman mosaics known from Britain begins to appear.3However, whereas the late mosaics undoubtedly show considerable regional distinctness, the position of the earliest work that pioneered the form in Britain is far less clear, perhapsbecause mosaics of the first and early second century A.D.are fewer and have excited much less interest. If the emphasis up to now has been on the mosaic, whether complete or fragmentary,too little attention has, perhaps, been focused on the materials, especially the tesserae, individually or collectively, which in their hundreds of thousands make up each floor. To what extent did the artist search out his materials, ratherthan simply exploit whatever was made available to him? To what extent is the style of a mosaicist revealed not just by stylistic features, but by the choice of materials and the way they were fashioned into shape? Would a metrical study of the individual tesserae and a quantitative evaluation of the different materials used help to characterise an individual's work? How did mosaicists fare in regions where suitable natural materials were limited? The potential range of geological and artificial materials which could be used to form tesserae is large, and the evidence currently embraces local or imported stone or marble types and ceramics such as tile/ brick or pottery, e.g. oxidised sigillata or reduced grey-black kitchen wares. Glass, too, whether
1 Dunbabin 1999, esp. 88-100 for Britain; Ling 1998. (See also Corpus de Mosaicos de Espahiafrom 1978; Mosa'ques de Tunisie from 1973; and Receuil ge'ne'ralde mosai'quesde la Gaule). 2 For second-century A.D. schools: Smith 1975, esp. 276-7; Smith 1984, esp. 362-4. For fourth-century A.D. schools: Smith 1965; Smith 1969, esp. 95-113; Smith 1984, 366-76; Johnston 1977; Smith's approach has been criticised by Ling (1997, 264-9) and new work on defining stylistic groupings has been taken forward in the context of the British corpus by Neal and Cosh 2002, 20-9. 3 Neal and Cosh 2002.
Mosaics patterns and designs, their figurative images, and their development through time have
one of the best knownart forms in the Romanworld.Theirgeometric represent
? World copyright reserved. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies 2004
10
J.R.L. ALLEN AND M.G. FULFORD
deliberately fashioned as tesserae, or from discardedvessels, is found. Coloured slags may also have been exploited. Individual tesserae or larger assemblages may not have the same aesthetic appeal as the mosaic pavement itself, but the aim of this paper is to consider what can be deduced from a large assemblage of loose tesserae from a known site and early context. In the first place, the analysis of the materials with a view to determining their shape characteristics as well as their petrological features and provenance offers a way of linking them with tesserae employed in other mosaics of a similar date but from a different location. This then invites the question whether any shared materials can be equated with shared style and design. Were all the mosaics using the same material made by the same workshop? One furthercorollary is that it should be possible to develop from the loose tesserae some sense of the style and patterning of the original floors which have otherwise been destroyed. In putting forwardevidence that bears on these various questions, we have not attemptedto examine every early mosaic that has been reported from Roman Britain, but have concentrated our attention on the region largely to the south of the estuaries of the Thames and Severn, where material survives from a wide and representativerange of military and civil constructions.
SILCHESTER INSULA IX BACKGROUND
Since 1997 excavations have been continuing of an area of some 3000 m2, representing about one-third of Insula IX, immediately to the north-west of the forum-basilica in Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum) in northernHampshire (FIG.1).4 The insula was first excavated in 1893-94 and a brief
KEY TO SITES 0 towns * civil/public * military
Caerleon
ri
Kmr a lSilchester
4',j?Eccles
LondonAEstuary
ENGLCH CAL C
1.4NN 100 km
ourTdops
haomes
Angmering Exeter CorfeCastle Fishbourne Kimmeridge Bay .Kimmeridge CHANN I

CHANVNEL
ENGL/SH
EL
Ringstead Boy Isle of Portland
Outcrops of Cloy Formation
FIG.1.
Distribution of sampled sites with early Roman mosaics and opus sectile in southern Britain.
Clarke and Fulford 2002.
EARLYROMAN MOSAIC MATERIALSIN SOUTHERN BRITAIN
11
reportandplan were published.5The new excavations have not only shown that a very high percentage of the original stratigraphysurvived the Victorian excavations, but that the development of the area was complex. As far as the main finding of the original excavation, House 1, is concerned, this can now be shown to conflate a complex development where two masonry houses were constructed as replacementsfor timber-framedbuildings in the laterfirst century A.D., subsequently demolished and then succeeded in the second century A.D. by a larger, hall-like building which occupied in full the site of its predecessors. In its turn this building was demolished no later than the third century A.D. To the south of the two town-houses there are furthertraces of early Roman buildings which pre-date the late Roman arrangementsof the insula but whose remains have yet to be fully excavated. Of the sequence of masonry buildings thus far excavated no original flooring remained in situ except in the corner of the central room of the northern of the two first-centurymasonry houses. Here there was a group of tile tesserae which probably once bordered a mosaic. That there were mosaics associated with one or both of these houses, and with the early structureswhose excavation has yet to be completed, is implied by the number of tesserae which have emerged in the course of the excavation, and particularlyfrom contexts associated with the demolition of the early buildings and the levelling and make-up of ground prior to the construction of new buildings from the late third century A.D. These can reasonably be assumed to have derived from early Roman buildings dating from the later first century A.D. and destroyed no later than c. A.D. 200-250. Indeed, the earliest examples come from contexts associated with the construction of the masonry houses of the later first century A.D., implying that some at least derive from pre-Flavian floors. A striking feature of these tesserae is both their range of materials and associated colours and, in the case of some materials, their small size and, in the case of others, their extreme variation in size. In trying to develop a plausible impression of the interior decor of our early houses, we have the possibility of linking them with other Silchester mosaics recovered from earlier excavations and stored in the Museum of Reading. In this respect, the fact that our materials have a clear terminus ante quem for their final deposition has an added value, since none of the early finds of mosaics can be related to dated archaeological contexts. At least throughour materials we have the possibility of providing the first foundations toward a chronological frameworkfor the Silchester mosaics. Excluding very large tesserae of broken brick or tile used for containment borders, which were not systematically examined, a total sample of 1,309 whole or broken/weatheredtesserae resulted from the 1997-2003 excavations (Table 1). Yields were very low in the higher contexts at Insula IX but increased by an order of magnitude in the lower levels. A significant proportionof the tesserae, coming from a range of dated but chiefly early contexts, carriedtraces of a white, sandy mortarand, in a few cases, of opus signinum, and it was often clear that these had been smoothed by wear on one face. Among the collections was a small fragment from an actual mosaic (see below). Although on a proportionof the tesserae it may not have survived, most tesserae lacked traces of mortar,and appearedfresh and unused.All tesserae were examined using a hand-lens, and representativesamples were thin-sectioned for microscopic examination and some powdered for mineralogical analysis by x-ray diffraction. The tesserae fall into 22 categories of lithology or fabric, divided between six groups: sandstones (S), rocks dominated by carbonate minerals (L), flint (F), burnt mudrocks (M), ceramic (C), and miscellaneous (X). By number, one fabric (La) comprises c. 71 per cent of the assemblage, while another(Mc) contributesc. 17 per cent. The remaining fabrics are largely present to the extent of less than 1 per cent each.
SANDSTONE TESSERAE
Lithology Sa is an off-white to pale grey, fine- to medium-grained quartz sandstone to quartzose limestone with variable amounts of coarse shell and other skeletal debris, pellets of microcrystalline
5 Fox 1894.
12
J.R.L. ALLEN AND M.G. FULFORD TABLE 1. COMPOSITION OF SAMPLE OF TESSERAE FROM INSULA IX, SILCHESTER.
Category Sandstones Sa Sb Sc Sd Subtotal Carbonate rocks La Lb Lc Ld Subtotal Burnt mudrocks Ma Mb Mc Subtotal
No. 23 27 1 1 52 924 17 2 1 944 42 6 217 265
% 1.76 2.06 0.08 0.08 3.98 70.59 1.30 0.15 0.08 72.12 3.21 0.46 16.58 20.25
Category Flint Fa Fb Subtotal Ceramic Ca Cb Cc Cd Ce Cf Cg Subtotal Miscellaneous Xa Xb Subtotal
No. 4 2 6 25 5 3 1 1 2 1 38 2 2 4
% 0.31 0.15 0.46 1.91 0.38 0.23 0.08 0.08 0.15 0.08 2.91 0.15 0.15 0.30
Grandtotals 1309 (100.02%) calcite, and an abundant calcareous cement. Thin oolitic coatings cover many of the carbonate grains and also some of the quartz. The quartz is subroundedto well rounded and very well sorted. There are scatteredgrains of plagioclase feldspar and microcline, and a little fresh to partly oxidised glauconite. This lithology is represented by very large, cuboidal tesserae that measure 25-35 mm along the side and were probably used in borders. One tessera includes a well preserved trace fossil, kindly identified by Dr R. Goldring (University of Reading) as Diplocraterion habichi, known from the Jurassic rocks of Britain and the North Sea, and the Tertiarybeds of Spain.6 Others are coarsely laminated. The provenance of this lithology is unknown. So far as a possible source in the Mesozoic rocks of southernEngland is concerned, however, the small amount of glauconite suggests a date not earlier than the latest Jurassic. The lithology Sb is a very hard, reddish black to black, medium- to coarse-grained, ferruginously cemented sandstone dominated by well rounded and sorted quartz. It too occurs only as very large, cuboidal tesserae that would have been used in borders. They were cut from naturally worn, platy lumps of the rock, probably collected from a Pleistocene fluvial gravel deposit. The naturally worn surfaces that survive on many of these tesserae are smooth, polished, and, in some instances, faintly dimpled as if sculpturedby wind-blown sand on a gravel plain devoid of protecting vegetation. The whereabouts of the gravels is unknown, but the rock itself suggests an ultimate provenance in either the early Cretaceous of the southern English Midlands or perhaps the Tertiary of the Hampshire Basin. A soft, light yellow, very fine-grained, slightly micaceous quartzsandstone is assigned to lithology Sc. It is representedby a single tessera, of normal size (for Silchester, see modulartessera in FIG.2A). Lacking macroscopic distinguishing features, it is not possible to suggest a provenance. Lithology Sd, also representedby a single normal-sized tessera, is of a soft, greyish brown, slightly micaceous, very coarse quartzsiltstone to very fine sandstone. The provenance is unknown.
6 Goldring et al. 1998, 361-3, 370.
EARLYROMAN MOSAIC MATERIALSIN SOUTHERN BRITAIN CARBONATE TESSERAE
13
Overwhelming all other categories in the collections, lithology La is in hand-specimen a very variable, weakly effervescent, finely granularcarbonaterock that ranges in colour on the surfaces of tesserae from light yellowish grey to yellowish black, depending on soil conditions. The bedding is evident on the paler surfaces as scattered to very abundant,parallel streaks of black organic matter. On broken surfaces, however, the rock is dark yellowish to brownish grey, and in badly weathered examples borders on ginger. Several tesserae contained poorly preserved marine fossils, notably oyster spat and the bones, especially the skulls, of small fish. These fossils are not stratigraphically diagnostic, other than supportinga broad Mesozoic-Tertiaryage (see Palaeontological Note below). In thin-section under the microscope (FIG.3A, B), La is a uniform, very finely to finely granular dolomite dominated by sub-idiomorphic crystals with a little calcite, either interstitial or as occasional oval patches (?pellets). Organic matter is very variable in amount and is represented by irregularbut otherwise parallel streaks of translucent golden yellow to brown amorphous material or opaque debris. There are low but variable amounts of quartz silt and, normally associated with any opaque organic matter, a little framboidal pyrite. Mineralogical analysis (Table 2) shows that the dolomite mineral is ferroan, possibly including the variety ankerite, and reveals the presence of a small proportion of clay minerals. In the British stratigraphicalsuccession, dolomites of this characterare restricted to the lithologically varied Kimmeridge Clay Formation (Upper Jurassic), chiefly exposed on the Channel coast of Dorset to the east of Weymouth and in the south-western Isle of Purbeck where, as thin, hard, cementstone bands among predominantmudrocks, they create numerous conspicuous ledges (e.g. Flats Stone Band, Yellow Ledge Stone Band).7 The thin-section appearanceof a representativesample from Kimmeridge Bay (British National Grid Reference SY 3C and the mineralogical composition listed in Table 2. 90 78) is shown in FIG.
TABLE 2. MINERALOGICAL COMPOSITION OF REPRESENTATIVELa TESSERAE/OPUS SECTILE/RAW MATERIAL FROM EARLY ROMAN SITES.
Site Insula IX, Silchester Kimmeridge Clay Formation, Kimmeridge Bay Museum of Reading Exeter FishbourneRoman Palace Eccles villa London PlantationPlace PlantationPlace WinchesterPalace WinchesterPalace Caerleon Norden, Corfe Castle
cristobalite -
weight percentage of crystalline component mica kaolinite calcite quartz 3 2 5 8 2 2 5 14 8 3 5 6 13 7 7 6 5 7 10 6 6 7 1 3 2 2 3 1 2 3 5 2 3 4 1 1 3 tr 1 1 3 3 7
dolomite' 82 77 84 90 85 90 86 93 92 89 82 92 88 82
tr tr tr tr tr
andmayincludethe varietyankerite. mineral is ferroan 'The dolomite

7
Arkell 1947; Feistner 1989; House 1993; Macquaker and Gawthorpe 1993; Gallois 1998; Morgans-Bell et al.
2001.
14
The tesserae of La from Insula IX seem to have been manufactured in modular form with the intention of being used directly in this way or after on-site reduction as need dictated. A sub-sample of 518 undamaged/unweatheredexamples ranged in dry weight - the most convenient measure of size - over two orders of magnitude, from a fraction of a gram to more than 20 g (FIG.2A). The typical tesserae from the insula may be taken as defining the module, namely, a cuboidal object measuring 9 or 10 mm along each side. Given a bulk density for the rock measured at c. 2470 kg/m3, the modular tessera will weigh c. 1.8-2.5 g. Some of the tesserae have the form of a double cube (double-tessera) and there are a few, neatly fashioned lumps of La that are tabularand resemble four cuboidal tesserae arrangedin a square (quadruple-tessera).Descending on the scale of size, there are numerous half-modulartesserae (half-tesserae), shaped as either square tablets or triangularprisms. These could have been produced by dividing a modular tessera along either a perpendicular or a diagonal. Quarter-tesseraeare pencil-like and appear to have been made by carefully halving along a perpendiculara half-modulartablet. The gaps between the respective weight ranges as depicted in 2A arise because, as is to be expected, the cuboidal tesserae as a whole are more variable than is FIG. implied by the specification given for the 'typical' modular form.
I
I I I
50
quartertesserae
half tesserae
doubletessera
quadrupletessera essera
40tesser
no.
%
tessera
30 n 518
20
10
0
0-25 0"50 50 100 2.00 4"00 (g) weight 8"00 16-00 32-00 64-00
B
40 no.% 30 n=128
20
10
0-125
FIG.
0-25
0-50 I 00 weight (g)
2-00
4-00
2.
Size-frequency distributions (weight, logarithmic scales) of undamaged/unweatheredtesserae from Insula IX, Silchester. A: lithology La (dolomite cementstone). B: lithology Mc (red burnt mudrock).
15
Only a small numberof tesserae representlithology Lb, and these include a fragmentfrom a mosaic composed of seven modulartesserae of the rock mortaredtogether. The lithology is a hard,white to very pale cream chalk generally lacking visible shell fragments. Their provenance is clearly in the Upper Cretaceous Chalk, outcropping in England from the English Channel coast to the Yorkshire Wolds, but no attempthas been made to assign them, either lithologically or palaeontologically, to a locality or horizon within that thick and extensive formation. Lithology Lc is as distinctive as it is rare. It is a yellowish green limestone composed of the shells of small bivalves, ostracods, and smooth-whorled gastropods set in a coarsely crystalline calcite cement. Partly filling the interiorsof some shells and other interstices are yellow to dull green, finely crystalline clay-like minerals, probably authigenic. The rock is representedby two small, cuboidal tesserae measuring c. 6 mm along the side. That a Mesozoic-Tertiary source is likely is as much as can at present be said. Lithology Ld is representedby a single modular tessera. It is a hard, light grey, microcrystalline limestone, but neither a chalk nor a typical marble. The provenance is unknown.
BURNT MUDROCK TESSERAE
The third commonest material (3.21 per cent) in the collections from Insula IX is lithology Ma. In hand-specimen and thin-section (FIG.5A) it is a very hard to brittle, pale to bright yellow, very fine-grained, fissile shale with a little mica and quartz silt, either scattered fairly evenly through the groundmass or gathered into faint, irregularlaminae. Several tesserae have small bivalves and gastropods in mouldic preservation. Typically, Ma is represented by small tablet-shaped or pencillike tesserae weighing about one gram or less. Given the evidence relating to lithology Mc (see below), the hardness of the material, and the presence of fossils only as moulds, lithology Ma is attributedto the burning of a mudstone of marine origin under controlled conditions. Lithology Mb in hand-specimen and thin-section is a dull orange to pinkish orange, very hard, faintly laminated mudstone or shale with occasional fossil moulds marked by yellowish streaks. Mb is also representedchiefly by small tesserae. It is finer grained than Mc, into which it appears to grade, and is attributedto burning, as explained below. The most prevalent burnt mudrock is lithology Mc. In hand-specimen and thin-section (FIG.5B) this is seen to be a bright to dark red, very hard to brittle, uniformly-texturedto 'streaky' or well laminated, silty mudstone to shale generally with fossil moulds marked by a yellow selvage. On weathering, the rock becomes dusky pink, either in a surface rind or throughout.A sub-sample of 128 of the tesserae considered to be undamaged gave a narrow, smoothly unimodal distribution of weights (FIG.2B) quite different from that of the carbonate rock La (FIG.2A). The tesserae of Mc vary from small cuboidal forms with sides measuring 5-7 mm to tablet- and pencil-like shapes and some resembling a triangularprism. Several preserve the moulds of molluscs and one of the largest, examined in detail (see Palaeontological Note below), has an assemblage compatible with a Jurassic age. The colour, hard and brittle character,and presence of fossil moulds is consistent with Mc having originated in the burning of an originally organic-rich silty shale of marine origin to temperatures in excess of c. 6500C, either deliberately or during the course of a wildfire. The geological literature shows that shales belonging to the Lias and the Kimmeridge Clay Formationof Jurassic age exposed along the Dorset coast have been set on fire in many places for short periods (e.g. Burning Cliff). Although spontaneous combustion has been claimed, in most cases a lightning strike was probably responsible, and in certain instances the burning was deliberate and controlled, for example, during post-medieval attempts to work the Kimmeridge Clay Formation for oil-shale.8 Of an example of
e.g. Buckland and De la Beche 1835; Cole 1974.
16
the combustion of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation in Ringstead Bay, Dorset, Buckland and De la Beche write that 'much of the shale near the central parts [of the fire] has undergone a perfect fusion, and is converted to a cellular slag. In the parts adjacent to the ignited portion of the cliff, where the effect of the fire has been less intense, the shale is simply baked and reduced to the condition of red tiles'.9 Similar reddened shales can be found at the sites of oil-shale works (e.g. Kimmeridge Bay), and waste from these sites, in hand-specimen and thin-section, is a close match for Mb and Mc. We also note that the unusual 'streaky' microscopic structuredepicted in FIG.5B has parallels in some mudrocks of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation.10Given these and other observations, and in the further light of the evidence of fossils above and to be presented from another early Roman mosaic site (see below), it accordingly seems probable that Mc and Mb are from the beds in Dorset. Ma could also derive from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation, but from a finer-grainedand possibly slightly calcareous facies burnt under less oxidising conditions. Yellow burnt mudrocks, however, have not so far been recorded from the Dorset coast.
CERAMIC TESSERAE
The commonest ceramic tesserae - small compared to the modular form of La - are chiefly cuboidal forms in fabric Ca. They are made of a hardto very hard, sandy ceramic materialthat grades outward in colour from dark red, through dark reddish grey, to purplish black beneath a flat surface with a thin, slightly vesicular, vitreous coating. The ceramic could have come from an overfired pot or tile but most resembles clay furnace-lining. Fabric Cb is clearly pottery. It is orange, grading outward to yellowish brown, soft, porous, and sandy. The tesserae are again small. Possibly from brick or tile, fabric Cc is red, moderately soft, and composed of a silty groundmass tempered with plentiful quartz sand and grains of flint. These tesserae are also small. Given the temper, this fabric is probably local to Silchester. Fabric Cd is also pottery. It is a soft, porous ceramic grading outward from pale yellow-orange to orange, and is composed of scattered,well sorted quartzsand and clay pellets with a little grog set in a coarsely micaceous groundmass. Only one small tessera is known. A South Gaulish samian vessel afforded the single tessera representingfabric Ce. It is hard,reddish orange in colour, and extremely fine-grained, with occasional tiny white inclusions. Another pottery fabric was used to make two small tesserae. Fabric Cf is soft, orange, and composed of abundant clay pellets and ore set with scattered medium-grained quartz sand in a slightly micaceous groundmass. Fabric Cg is soft, orange, and formed of a slightly micaceous, very fine-grained ceramic with occasional very coarse-grainedquartz sand. The tessera is small.
OTHER TESSERAE
The excavations yielded several small flint tesserae. They are sub-cuboidal in form, due to the shape and naturalfracturingof the parentmaterial, and are water-worn. Lithology Fa is brownish grey and seems to have developed in the Chalk mainly as thin plates. Lithology Fb is a dull reddish brown due to burning. There are a few tesserae of two miscellaneous categories. The tesserae of lithology Xa are greyish brown, soft and earthy, but of uncertain composition. The lithology may be a severely weathered form of the dolomite La. Category Xb, representedby small tesserae, is a darkblue, opaque, slightly vesicular glass or fuel-ash slag.
9 Buckland and De la Beche 1835, 23; see also House 1993, 115. 10 Macquaker and Gawthorpe 1993.
EARLYROMAN MOSAIC MATERIALSIN SOUTHERN BRITAIN SILCHESTER MOSAICS AT THE MUSEUM OF READING
17
Of the floors recovered from the early excavations of Joyce and the Society of Antiquaries, an outstanding example of a probably early floor was lifted in 1898 from the remains of a house underlying House 2 in Insula XIX (Mosaic 2, Museum of Reading)." Traces of robbed outer (masonry) walls were identified, as well as of possible timber partitions between internal rooms. The building was put forwardby the excavators as the first example of a half-timbered construction at Silchester. Although no dating evidence was recovered, the house shares the same orientation as the Roman street grid and is therefore likely to be later than it, that is, later than about the mid-first century A.D.Although we cannot be certain without furtherexcavation, on the basis of the dating of the sequence of buildings on the site of 'House' 1 in Insula IX,12the structurebeneath House 2 in Insula XIX was probably erected in the later first century A.D. and demolished before the mid-third century. Although Mosaic 2 is badly damaged, two borders remain reasonably well preserved, and there are fragments of a furtherborder and of the centre of the pavement.13One panel, almost complete, depicts in black against a white backgroundtendrils and leaves of the acanthusSmilax aspera along its length. The border of the adjoining square has a scroll in a variety of colours - reds, yellows, greys and blacks - against a white background.Of the central part, divided into small rectangular panels, only parts of the guilloche and traces of fine figured work, depicted in red, yellow, grey, white, and black, survive with any integrity. The excavators14described the black material as a 'sandy limestone', the white lithology as 'hard chalk', the two shades of red as of 'brick', and the pale yellow materials as 'perhaps also brick'. The greenish-grey stone they identified as 'Purbeck marble'. Parallels, at least in terms of the polychrome materials used, are to be found with the panels of a second floor, inserted into a framework of coarser materials. It was discovered in 1895 decorating the floor of a long room or corridoron a broadly east-west line that linked the east and west ranges of House 2 in Insula XIV (Mosaic 1, Museum of Reading), but in House I (Room 23) in the same insula a well-preserved and purely bichrome (black-and-white) mosaic was encountered.15 Although apparently earlier than the eastern range, which appears to have been built around it, there is no independent evidence for the date of the corridor in House 2 or of the other constituent parts of the house. However, it is at right-angles to the western half of the building, which shares an orientation a few degrees at odds with that of the street grid. Hence this element of the house may be relatively early, of later first- or second-century A.D. date. The excavators observed that one of the panels of Mosaic 1 was decorated in the form of a basket of flowers and used tesserae of 'glass paste'.16Aside from this specific case, and a reference to the bright red tesserae as 'always of brick', there is little comment on the materials used for the flooring in the corridor.They were, however, considered to be the same as those used for a number of mosaics in House 1 in the insula, and to be largely 'of native stones'. The bichrome mosaic from House I has an over-all fret or key pattern alternating with squares filled with simple geometric motifs, of at least twelve kinds. This floor has stylistic similarities with a mosaic in Room N 13 at Fishbourne Roman Palace (see below). Mosaic 2 from House 1 in Insula XIX at Silchester is now stored at the Museum of Reading, where it was examined. Although the surface was not clean, sufficient was clearly visible to confirmthat the
11 St John Hope and Fox 1899, plans, esp. facing p. 244; Boon 1974, 217-21; we are indebted to Jill Greenaway for the opportunity to examine the Silchester mosaics preserved at the Museum of Reading. 12 Clarke and Fulford 2002. 13 St John Hope and Fox 1899. 14 St John Hope and Fox 1899, 249. 15 St John Hope and Fox 1896, plan facing p. 234, 241-2, pl. XIII; Boon 1974, 215-17. 16 St John Hope and Fox 1896, 242-2, 246.
18
constituentmaterialswere a hard,white chalk, a subordinatedarkgrey-black stone, and an occasional dark red material, as well as a range of ceramics. The grey-black material is a cementstone, the cleaner, lighter-weatheredtesserae of the rock revealing abundantparallel streaks of black organic matter.This lithology and the chalk are representedchiefly by tablet-shapedhalf-tesserae set parallel with the surface of the mosaic in a white mortar.Many of the tesserae are large (c. 15 by 15 by 6-9 mm)- as the excavators noted - compared to their counterpartsfrom Insula IX (FIG.2A).17 The excavators commented, however, on the frequency with which tesserae one-quarterof an inch square (c. 6 by 6 mm) or smaller were used, remarking, 'No other pavement as yet found on the site has shown such delicate work as is here exhibited'. The dark red material occurs only as small tesserae and, at least under the hand-lens, is not brick but identical in our judgement to lithology Mc at that site. We are unable to confirm the presence of Purbeck marble reportedby the excavators. A cementstone tessera loosened when the mosaic was moved to the store proved to be a ferroan dolomite with a little quartz and kaolinite (Table 2). Another, in thin-section (FIG.3D), is a finely granulardolomite with a small but varying amount of yellow to brown, amorphousorganic matterin irregularstreaks, a little opaque organic material with pyrite, and scattered quartz silt. On this basis, the dark grey stone in Mosaic 2 - the 'sandy limestone' of the excavators - may be confidently identified as lithology La at Insula IX (FIG. 3A, B; Table 2), which we consider to have been procured from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation(FIG.3C, Table 2). Mosaic 1 from House 2 in Insula XIV is represented by fragments of guilloche from one of the small panels. Hand-lens inspection reveals tesserae of white chalk, Kimmeridgiancementstone, and an orange ceramic set in a white mortar.As these were all in situ, petrographic and mineralogical analyses were not attempted. The bichrome mosaic from House 1 in Insula XIV can be seen on the wall of the Atrium Gallery at the Museum of Reading. The exposed surfaces of the tesserae are scratched, pitted, weathered, and in many cases stained. However, hand-lens inspection showed the white stone to be from the Chalk, and the grey-black material to be a finely granularcementstone resembling that in the other Silchester mosaics that had been examined. The better preserved of the 'black' tesserae were finely streakedwith dark organic matter.
SOME OTHER EARLY MOSAICS IN SOUTHERN BRITAIN INTRODUCTION
The preceding sections have established the material relationship between the loose tesserae from Insula IX at Silchester and the mosaics from Insulae XIV and XIX. In the case of the latter, there is a strong a priori case for an early date, such that we can reasonably add it to the schedule of the earliest mosaics from Roman Britain. For Insula XIV, further excavation is required to test the hypothesis. Since the same geological materials were used in mosaics across three scattered insulae, the probability is that they were used extensively across the town. To turn for confirmationof the earliest use of our materials we need to explore those sites where there are survivals of mosaics, or at least of mosaic and other fine flooring materials, combined with good dating evidence. This combination we find with confidence at three sites: the 'proto-palace' phase of the villa at Fishbourne(West Sussex), the Neronian legionary fortress at Exeter, and certain sites in London. Although the excavations are not yet fully published, the case for an early date for mosaics at the Eccles villa (Kent) is strong, and there is plausible inferential evidence to add material from the early-founded villa at Angmering (West Sussex) to the list. Caerleon, fortress of Legion II Augusta after Exeter, along with the 'palatial' phase at Fishbourne, and furtherfinds from London,
17 St John Hope and Fox 1899, 249.
19
FIG. 3. Dolomite cementstone tesserae (x10). A: Insula IX, Silchester; B: Insula IX, Silchester; C: Kimmeridge Clay Formation, Kimmeridge Bay; D: Silchester Mosaic 2, Museum of Reading; E: Legionary bath-house, Exeter; F: Fishbourne Roman Palace.
20
FIG.
4.
Dolomite cementstone tesserae and opus sectile (xl0). A: Eccles villa; B: Angmering villa; C: London, Watling Court; D: London, Winchester Palace; E: Fortress bath-house, Caerleon; F: Norden, Corfe Castle.
21
FIG.5. Burnt mudrock tesserae and raw material (xl0). A: Ma, Insula IX, Silchester; B: Mc, Insula IX, Silchester; C: Ma, Fishbourne Roman Palace; D: Raw Mc, Fishbourne Roman Palace; E: Mc, opus sectile, Angmering; F: Mc, Caerleon.
22
provide evidence for the continueduse of our materialsinto the late first/earlysecond centuryA.D.The Silchester floors probablybelong to this stage. For evidence from this time of the primaryworking of raw material into tesserae and opus sectile we turn to the site of Norden, Corfe Castle (Dorset).
EXETER (DEVON)
The fortress of Legion II Augusta was established at Exeter (FIG.1) in c. A.D. 55.18 Some twelve fragments of mosaic and many loose tesserae in a number of colours are believed to have come from a mosaic or mosaics contemporarywith the construction of the baths, c. A.D. 60. Three fragments were found in the demolition deposit of c. A.D. 75, the remainder in that of c. A.D. 80.19 Apart from the largest fragment (140 by 155 mm), which appears to depict a disc confronted by hoofed creatures,perhaps a globe flanked by Capricornand Pegasus, as emblems of Legion II, little can be said about what was originally portrayed. These fragments of mosaic and loose tesserae were subjected to hand-lens examination at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery.20 Opus signinum had been used to bind the We concur that the small red tesserae preserved in tesserae, and only three colours are represented.21 three fragments were manufacturedfrom samian sherds, and that the white tesserae, described as a 'fine-grained limestone, possibly from the Beer quarriesnear Lyme Regis', are of a hard chalk. The 'blue-grey' tesserae were described as 'of calcium iron carbonateor siderite of uncertain origin'. This 'ferruginous' rock is representedchiefly by modular tesserae, but with some double-tesserae, half-tesserae of triangular section, and occasional tablet-shaped half-tesserae set on edge. The modular tesserae (c. 1.5 g) are on the small side compared to Insula IX at Silchester (FIG.2A). The rock is dark brownish grey weathering to pale grey, weakly effervescent, finely granular and, on surfaces that cut the bedding, finely streakedwith darkorganic matter.Mineralogical analysis reveals a ferroan dolomite with subordinatequartz and a little clay (Table 2). Representative thin-sections of other tesserae (FIG.3E) confirm the predominanceof dolomite and show a faintly laminated rock with small amounts of yellow-brown amorphous and opaque organic matter in parallel streaks and very occasional quartz silt. There is occasional pyrite and one preparationincluded a fish scale. The ferruginous blue-grey tesserae from the bath-house at Exeter are identical in all essential respects with lithology La at Silchester (FIG.3A, B; Table 2) and we consider them to have been procured from the Kimmeridge Clay Formationof Dorset (FIG.3C, Table 2).
FISHBOURNE ROMAN PALACE (WEST SUSSEX)
The earliest evidence of surviving mosaics from the great Roman building at Fishbourne,at the head of Chichester Harbour (FIG.1), comes from the Flavian 'palace' of Period II, dating from c. A.D. 75.22They are now protected, along with floorings from Period III, within a covered space over the North Wing. Most of the mosaics available for inspection are in black and white, presenting a limited range of patterns:squares within a frameworkof diagonal lines forming lozenge shapes; squares set alternatelywith swastika-meandershapes; repetitive overlapping rectangles; and a chequerboardof solid squares of two different sizes. The motifs include compass-designed rosettes, rosettes of leaves and scrolls, triangles placed apex to base, squares set diagonally within squares, squares overlapping a central square, and infilled crosses. Although the preservation is fragmentary,the motifs seen in a mosaic from Room N13 invite comparison with those of the bichrome mosaic from House 1 in Insula XIV at Silchester. The squares are larger than at Silchester, however, and the motifs they
18 19 20 21 22 Bidwell 1979. Smith 1979. John Allan kindly facilitated this opportunity. Smith 1979, 132-4, pl. XVI. Cunliffe 1971a, 58, 59, 97, 146-50, pls 23b, 80c; 1971b, 16, 41-2.
23
contain appear to have been more complex. The polychrome mosaic in Room N20 is of a highly advanced design, composed of a circular panel enclosed within a square, with motifs incorporating tendrils extending into the corners. The chief material in these mosaics was briefly described as a 'hard white chalk', ascribed to the local Upper Chalk (?Chalk Rock). Also reportedas tesserae was 'a grey sandy shale ... similar to stones of the Wealden series of East Sussex', later described as a 'darkgrey ... hard silty shale', and claimed, but without supportingevidence, to be 'from a Jurassic, possibly Kimmeridge, shale'. Altogether we examined four groups of material from Fishbourne: the earliest a block of raw stone from the Neronian-early Flavian builders' yard; in situ or relocated mosaic floors of Period II and Period III date in the North Wing (hand-lens inspection only); and loose tesserae from later excavations of the west wing and from an area to the east of the Period II 'palace'.23 The covered floors are clean and uncoated, allowing identifications to be made with some confidence. In most cases the full extent of the mosaic was accessible. Tesserae of hardwhite chalk dominated all the floorings. The tesserae for the decorative elements are predominantlyof a brownish grey, weakly effervescent, finely granularcementstone weathering from mid-grey to dark grey and, in a few cases, to almost black. Tellingly, the paler surfaces carry fine streaks of dark organic matter, and we accordingly identify the stone as lithology La at Silchester, which we show was procuredfrom the Kimmeridge Clay Formation.The earlier mosaics, in Rooms N3, N424 and N12,25 are of chalk and cementstone only. Some coloured tesserae appear in the slightly later mosaics. The 'Fortress' mosaic relaid in Room N16,26 but originally beneath the 'Dolphin' mosaic in Room N7, has some tesserae of orange-red ceramic and a few, in the corners, of a pale grey limestone-sandy limestone. The 'Dolphin' mosaic in Room N727 includes ceramic tesserae, bright red in some cases but darkred to blackish red and hard-firedin others. There are also tesserae of yellow-orange fine-grained limestone. Two superimposed floorings with some coloured tesserae are visible in Room N13. The lower28includes a reddish black, very fine-grained limestone. The upper29also has this limestone, accompanied by a pale yellow to white very fine-grained limestone or possibly chalk, a bright red ceramic, a reddish black ceramic, and a hard, dusky pink burnt mudrock comparable with lithology Mc at Silchester. The coloured tesserae seen in Room N2030 are a buff and a red ceramic, accompanied by a bright yellow burnt mudrock with scattered shell fragments preserved as moulds. The latter under the hand-lens is indistinguishable from lithology Ma at Silchester. These various hand-lens identifications are borne out by petrographicand mineralogical work on similar loose material at Fishbourne. The typical loose cementstone tessera from the area of the palace is cuboidal but slightly larger (c. 11 by 11 by 11 mm) than its modular counterpartat Insula IX, Silchester. A sample of fourteen of these tesserae ranged in weight from 1.61-6.70 g, averaging 3.35 g (cf. FIG.2A). Mineralogically, the rock is a ferroandolomite with a little quartzand occasional calcite and kaolinite (Table 2). Thinsections show a finely granular dolomite with variable amounts of yellow-blood red, amorphous organic matter and opaque organic material with pyrite in fine, irregular,parallel streaks (FIG.3F). There is some quartzsilt and very occasional fish bones and scales. The material compares well with cementstones in the Kimmeridge Clay Formation(FIG.3C). The later excavations also afforded many small to large tesserae of a dusky pink to dark red
23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
We are indebted to David Rudkin for this opportunity. Cunliffe 1971a, 94, pl. 21 (Period II). Cunliffe 1971a, 96-7, pls 24, 58 (Period II). Rudkin 1981, fig. 5. Cunliffe 1971a, 163-5, pls 47-53, 83, 88 (Period III); dated after c. A.D. 160 by Rudkin 1981, 8. Cunliffe 1971a, 97, pls 23b, 80c (Period II). Cunliffe 1971a 158-9, pls 43-4 (Period III). Cunliffe 1971a, 99, 149, pls 26-7, 81, 91 (Period II). Ling (1997, 270) questions this date.
24
material, and a lesser number of a bright yellow lithology. The latter in thin-section (FIG.5C) is a very fine-grained shale with little or no quartz silt except as occasional coarse laminae or burrowfills. It is indistinguishable from the burntmudrock Ma at Silchester. The pink-red material in handspecimen and thin-section is the same as lithology Mc at that site. It is a hard, brittle, crudely fissile, silty mudstone with occasional fossil moulds markedby yellowish selvages. Much worked stone was recovered from an area interpretedas a builders' working yard beneath the East Wing of the Flavian palace and contemporarywith the Neronian-early Flavian 'proto-palace'.31 Found in large amounts was a 'red fossiliferous silty mudstone' of 'probably Mediterraneanorigin' and, in lesser quantity, a 'buff-coloured [later described as yellow] fossiliferous silty mudstone, probablyof similar origin'. These materials had been used at the yard to produce opus sectile tiles square,triangular,diamond-shapedand kite-shaped in the case of the red, and kite-shaped in the case of the single example in yellow. We were able to examine a substantial lump of raw material of the red lithology probably from the yard. It is identical with lithology Mc at Silchester, which we regard as burnt mudrock from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation. The rock is a dark red, pink-weathering, crudely fissile, 'streaky' to faintly laminated, silty mudstone with fossil moulds marked by yellow selvages (FIG.5D). This richly fossiliferous lump (see Palaeontological Note below) contains a perisphinctid ammonite of the genus Pectinatites, restricted to the upper part of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation (Jurassic, Lower Volgian Stage). A recent study asserts the same provenance for the red burnt mudrock, but offers no supporting evidence.32 We have not been able to examine the yellow opus sectile, but the published description strongly suggests lithology Ma, known as tesserae in the Flavian mosaics and as loose material. Fairly common at the yard is 'a grey sandy shale', later reportedas 'grey-brown siltstone' or 'grey Wealden shale',33 but also as a possible Kimmeridge shale, in the light of then recent discoveries at Corfe Castle (see below).34 It was used for a small range of geometrical tiles and, in the Flavian palace, as wall-inlay along with the red and yellow burntmudrocks.We have not seen the tile or inlay of grey siltstone but, in the form of tesserae, the same name is applied to our lithology La at Silchester, procuredfrom the KimmeridgeClay Formationand therefore not from Wealdenrocks or the Weald.
ECCLES VILLA (KENT)
The village of Eccles overlooks the valley of the tidal Medway c. 6 km to the north-north-westof Maidstone (FIG.1). The earliest Roman phase (Period I) of the villa there, excavated over many years (1962-76), has been dated to c. A.D. 65. While interim reports, including a summary report of the whole, have been published, the full report,with detailed chronological evidence, is still awaited.35 The mosaic fragments in question here were derived from Room 46, but are assumed to have been stripped from the frigidarium of the Period I bath-house, which was destroyed c. A.D. 120. The excavator considered that the original mosaics had been salvaged and stored for re-use. Although doubts have been expressed about a date as early as c. A.D. 65 for these mosaics, that possibility still remains. Greaterconfidence may be attachedto the date of c. A.D. 120 as a terminusante quem. Most of the fragments have lozenge patterns while others have flower motifs, simple and three-strand guilloche, and parts of what may be human figures. The latter are cogently argued to be the remains of two gladiators.36Previous descriptions of the mosaic materials referred only to their colours of white, yellow, orange, green, blue-grey, red-purple,and shades of black.
31 Cunliffel971a, 58; 1971b, 16, 33-5. 32 Peacock and Williams 1995.

33 34 Cunliffe 1971b, table 4. Cunliffe 1971b, 16, 41.
35 Detsicas 1963, 1964, 1965, 1969, 1977. For general background see Detsicas 1987. 36 Neal 1981, 76 (Mosaic 43).
25
Hand-lens inspection showed Mosaic 1 from thefrigidarium to be made of at least four different geological materials, set in a white, sandy mortar:hard white chalk, very pale grey limestone, a dark red lithology, and darkgrey cementstone.37There are also some ceramic tesserae. The limestone is a compact rock formed of well sorted and rounded, coarse-grained biogenic fragments with scattered, ovoidal pellets of greenish black glauconite cemented by coarsely crystalline calcite. A local Lower Cretaceous source seems likely, given the presence of glauconite. The dark red material is a hard, brittle, faintly laminated, burntmudrock with scattered fossil moulds markedby yellow selvages. It occurs as small, cuboidal tesserae and is indistinguishablefrom Mc at Insula IX, Silchester. The dark grey cementstone is coarsely granular,weakly effervescent and markedby abundant,parallel streaks of black organic matter.It closely resembles lithology La at Silchester and occurs as mainly modular tesserae, but on the small side compared to that locality. Mosaic 3 was composed of tablet-shaped, half-tesserae of hard chalk and dark grey cementstone, both laid parallel with the surface, together with some small, mainly cuboidal tesserae of dark red and yellow burnt mudrocks, and orange, red and buff ceramics. The mortar is again sandy and white. A cementstone tessera preparedin thin-section (FIG. 4A) is a faintly laminated,finely granular dolomite with very abundantirregularbut parallel streaks of blood-red, amorphousorganic material, scattered circular-ovoidal areas of microcrystalline calcite (?pellets) and some opaque organic matter with pyrite. Table 2 gives the mineralogy of another tessera. Although the thin-sectioned example is not wholly typical, the grey cementstone is clearly the ferroan dolomite lithology La at Silchester (FIG.3A, B), from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation (FIG.3C, Table 2). The half-tesserae (weight c. 0.7-0.9 g) are, however, on the small side compared to those from the town (FIG.2A). A thin-sectioned red tessera showed a dense, crudely laminated, silty mudrock with scattered fossil moulds, similar to lithology Mc at Silchester. Resembling in thin-section lithology Ma at Silchester was a yellow tessera. The material is a faintly laminated, very fine-grained shale with fossil moulds and, exceptionally, a band of mixed quartz silt, clay, and dolomite crystals. The dolomite suggests a source linked stratigraphicallywith that of Mc.
ANGMERING VILLA (WEST SUSSEX)
The remains of the Roman villa at Angmering lie c. 24 km to the east of Fishbourne (FIG. 1).38 Although only the bath-house has been excavated, the evidence for the quality of the interior decor has been seen to parallel the furnishingsof Fishbournein its proto-palacephase, and there is a precise parallel in the surviving opus sectile.39 Indeed, it was suggested that the two buildings were by the same architect.40Although the chronological evidence is limited, it supports a possible Neronianearly Flavian date of c. A.D. 65-75. A considerable range of flooring and building materials was reportedfrom Angmering.41The opus sectile, represented by triangular,trapezoidal, kite-shaped, square and octagonal tiles, is said to be of 'pink, yellow and dark grey stones from the Wealden series, white limestone from northernItaly, together with Sussex marble'. An implicit reference to the presence of a bichrome mosaic hints at the use of 'grey stones obtained from the Weald near-by'. Geological examination of some of the building materials suggested the presence of the local Upper Chalk (building blocks),42 a coarsely crystalline white marble (a slab), and the foraminiferal Scaglia limestone of northern Italy (white tesserae and tiles).43
37
We are indebted to David Neal for the opportunity to examine and sample this material. 38 Scott 1938, 1939; Wilson 1947. For general background see Cunliffe 1973.
39 Cunliffe 1971b, fig. 17 (bottom left).
40 41 42 43
Cunliffe 1971a, 63, 65, 67, 75. Scott 1938, 15, 17. Scott 1938, 43 (reported by E.C. Martin). Scott 1938, 43-4 (reported by K.P. Oakley).
26
As at Eccles, the flooring of the bath-house was not encountered in situ. Some of the excavated material - fragments of mosaic and loose tesserae and tiles - is retained in the Educational Collection at the LittlehamptonMuseum, where it was subjected to hand-lens examination.44The number of mosaic floors represented is uncertain but the character of the tesserae we have seen suggests that there was more than one. The collection includes two fragments of a mosaic composed of small, cuboidal to tablet-shaped tesserae (c. 11 by 8 by 5 mm) of a white, compact, very fine-grained, marble-like limestone, which may be the same as the rock claimed to be the Scaglia limestone. One fragment is wholly of this lithology, whereas in the other there are a few tesserae of a dark grey to black stone. This differs significantly from lithology La at Silchester, being non-effervescent and without visible streaks of organic matter.The tesserae are set in white mortarwith a little sand and occasional crushed brick/ tile. The other mosaic fragmentsand loose tesserae are more familiar.A hard,white chalk is represented by loose tesserae and by a small cluster of medium-large, cuboidal forms. The other rock present is grey-weathering, weakly effervescent, finely granular and streaked with dark organic matter. It is represented chiefly by a group of large double tesserae (c. 12 by 13 by 23 mm) set vertically in opus signinum. A loose tessera was thin-sectioned (FIG.4B), revealing a faintly laminated, finely granulardolomite with a small to moderate amount of yellow-reddish brown, amorphous organic matterin irregularstreaks, accompanied by two fish bones/scales. There was insufficient material for mineralogical analysis in addition, but there can be little doubt that the rock is the same as lithology La at Silchester (FIG.3A, B), namely, a cementstone from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation (FIG. 3C). Only pink floor tiles had been retained. Edges and a representativethin-section (FIG.5E) reveal a hard,pink-weathering,darkred, streakyto crudely laminated, silty mudstone with numerous moulds of shell fragments and occasionally of large bivalve molluscs, all marked by yellow selvages. The material is indistinguishable microscopically and in hand-specimen from lithology Mc at Silchester and elsewhere. The presence of red burntmudrocksuggests that the yellow tiles at the bath-house are of lithology Ma, and that the grey stone reported as opus sectile is the Kimmeridgian cementstone (FIG.3C). The claimed procurementof the 'pink, yellow and dark grey stones from the Wealden series',45or from the Weald, can no longer be sustained.
LONDON
We examined samples of loose tesserae from three different locations in London, two from north of the Thames, east and west of the Walbrook,and one from Southwarkto the south (FIG.1).46 The tesserae from mosaic fragments excavated at Watling Court, west of the Walbrook, were associated with timber-framedBuildings D, F, and H of Period 4, assigned a Flavian-Trajanicdate. These buildings were destroyed by the Hadrianic fire of c. A.D. 120-130. Although we cannot attributeour tesserae to particularmosaic fragments, the predominantcolours of them all are black and white.47The loose material includes both modular and double-tesserae. The white material is a hardchalk but the black is a fine-grained,yellowish brown, weakly effervescent cementstone marked 4C) the rock is a finely granular by fine, parallel streaks of dark organic matter.In thin-section (FIG. dolomite with variable amounts of yellow to brown, amorphous organic material in sub-parallel streaks, opaque organic matter,and occasional quartzsilt and pyrite. The tesserae had been mounted in white, sandy mortarwith occasional crushed brick/tile.
44 Rebecca Fardell kindly arranged for us to examine what has survived from the excavations.
45 46 47 Scott 1938, 15, 17. These observations were made possible through the kindness of Jennifer Hall, Susan Pringle, and John Shepherd. Perring and Roskams with Allen 1991, esp. 88-94, with a note on the pavements by D.J. Smith, 88-94.
27
Excavations in 2000 to the east of the Roman forum at PlantationPlace, FenchurchStreet,produced evidence of timber-framedbuildings dating from c. A.D. 70.48 One of these, also destroyed by the Hadrianicfire, was decoratedwith mosaic floors in adjacentrooms. The numerous loose tesserae we examined from the two, differently dated, contexts at this site are of a brownish grey weathering to pale grey, weakly to moderately effervescent cementstone marked by fine, parallel streaks of dark organic matter. In a few cases with traces of white mortar,they are chiefly modular tesserae similar in size to those at Silchester (FIG.2A), but there are some double-tesserae. Mineralogical analysis (Table 2) showed predominantdolomite with some quartz and small or trace amounts of kaolinite, calcite, and cristobalite. Microscopically, the rock is a finely granulardolomite with occasional to abundant,sub-parallel streaks of mainly brown, amorphousorganic matter, scattered quartz silt and some pyrite. Occasional fish bones/scales were noted. From south of the Thames we examined loose tesserae from the Winchester Palace excavation. These appear to be from Building 13, Room B, where the mosaic has a guilloche-mat design dated after c. A.D. 120.49They are chiefly double-tesserae and some modular tesserae, similar in size to those at Silchester (FIG.2A), of a yellowish to brownish grey, weakly effervescent, cementstone finely streaked with dark organic matter. Mineralogical analysis (Table 2) revealed predominant dolomite with subordinatequartzand some kaolinite and calcite. In thin-section (FIG. 4D), the rock is a finely crystalline dolomite with abundantirregularstreaks of golden brown, amorphousorganic matter and occasional pyrite framboids and quartz silt. A poorly preserved foraminiferawas noted. Representing another, unrelated lithology was a single tessera of dark grey, sandy limestone with scatteredgrains of greenish-black glauconite. With Fishbournein mind, cementstone tesserae from London sites have in the past been uniformly identified as of 'Wealden shale'. The mineralogical and petrographic features we record above, however, clearly proclaim the rock to be the same as lithology La at Silchester, and from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation of Dorset. Indeed, this lithology may be ubiquitous in early Roman floorings in London. Tesserae of 'Wealden shale', presumed to be the rock, together with those of chalk, are extensively recorded from excavations undertaken during 1991-98 in Southwark.so Their contexts range in date from the first century to the early second century A.D. Not only were cementstone tesserae found, but opus sectile tiles of 'Wealden shale' occurred at one site, in a preBoudiccan setting (Borough High Street) next to the main road leading south from the river crossing. Lithology Mc at Silchester - the red burnt mudrock - seems also to be present in at least two contexts, being described, again with Fishbourne in mind, as a 'deep pink, shelly, mudstone from a Mediterraneansource'. The glauconitic sandy limestone found at Winchester Palace is probably from a comparatively local, early Cretaceous 'greensand' formation.
CAERLEON (GWENT)
In c. A.D. 75 Legion II Augusta was transferredfrom Exeter or possibly Gloucester to Caerleon in south-east Wales, where a fortress was built on heights overlooking the valley of the tidal Usk (FIG. 1). There the legion remained until the late third century A.D.51 The only in situ mosaic known from the bath-house located within the fortress is represented by the substantial fragments discovered in 1877 at Backhall Street and dated to the A.D. 80s.52 Some of the flooring has survived, especially the substantial fragment portraying a possible thyrsus, an
48 MOLAS site FER97. Although the majority of the tesserae supplied come from contexts with a terminuspost quem of A.D. 70, one group derives from a potentially earlier context dated A.D. 50-70. Brigham 2001a, 2001b. 49 We are grateful to Carrie Cowan for this information in advance of publication. 50 Drummond-Murrayet al. 2002, 151-61. 51 Brewer 2002; Knight 2003, 8, 13. 52 Zienkiewicz 1986, 165-9, 339-40.
28
arrangementof ivy leaves inserted into the end of a hollow plant stem, associated with the cult of Bacchus.53The originalmosaic, set in opus signinum, appearsto have been squarewith an outerborder of four coloured bands and an inner square of one band which encloses several more, concentrically arrangedcoloured bands. A wreath lies between the outer bands and the inner square. Five colours of tesserae were used, described as creamy-white, dark grey/black, light bluish grey/blue, yellow, and red. The thyrsus fragment itself is displayed on one wall of the Fortress Baths building, under a modem cover, but poor lighting makes it difficult to examine the constituents with any thoroughness. However, all of the colours describedappearto be represented.A few loose tesserae from the Victorian excavations have also been retained.Loose tesserae were also recovered, in substantialnumbers,from various contexts during excavations at the baths in 1964-65, 1967, and 1981. These are described as white, grey brown/black,red (a stone not ceramic), and Purbeck marble.54The white tesserae are identified as chalk and the brown/blackas 'an argillaceous mudstone of uncertainorigin'. Mosaic fragments and loose tesserae from the Victorian excavations were examined at the Roman Many of the loose tesserae Legionary Museum, and the thyrsus fragmentitself was also scrutinised.55 are of a dark grey fine-grained, weakly effervescent cementstone finely streaked with black organic matter.One included as a mould part of a ribbed fossil, possibly an ammonite. A tessera subjected to mineralogical analysis was composed predominantly of ferroan dolomite with a little quartz, some kaolinite and a trace of christobalite (Table 2). In thin-section (FIG. 4E) the rock is a finely granular dolomite with a small amount of yellow-brown amorphous organic matter, a little opaque organic material with pyrite, and occasional quartz silt, fish bones and scales. It compares closely with the dolomite cementstones in the Kimmeridge Clay Formation (FIG.3C). Many dolomite cementstone tesserae finely streakedwith organic matteroccur among the loose material from the excavations of a century later. Also present at Backhall Street are tesserae of hard, white chalk, dark red burnt mudrock similar to lithology Mc at Silchester, a single tessera in orange ceramic, and tesserae of a pale grey, strongly effervescent, calcareous cementstone, probably from the local Lower Jurassic Lias. The dolomite, red mudrock,and ceramic are also representedamong the loose materialexcavated later at the site of the bath-house. The red mudrock in hand-specimen and thin-section (FIG.5F) is a streaky to crudely laminated mudstone with abundant quartz silt and occasional fossil moulds marked by yellowish selvages. Also present are a smaller number of tesserae of yellow burntmudrock closely resembling lithology Ma at Silchester. A thin-section revealed a delicately laminated, very fine-grained shale with occasional quartz silt. Similar assemblages of loose tesserae have come from the Prysg Field Barracksand the canabae.56 As has been noted,57 a striking feature of the fortress tesserae is their frequently large size, a propertyextending to those of burntmudrock.Although there are roughly cuboidal tesserae similar to the modular form at Silchester, there are abundant cuboids that are several millimetres larger, especially those of chalk, and numerous double-tesserae, set on end, of dolomite or mudrock that measure 25-35 mm in length. As a whole, the tesserae are much larger than those known from the legion's earlier bath-house at Exeter (see above).
NORDEN, CORFE CASTLE (DORSET)
Excavation at Norden, combined with random finds, has established the presence of a substantial, long-lived Romano-British industrial settlement c. I km to the north and north-west of Corfe Castle
53 Boon 1986. 54 Boon 1986, 273; Zienkiewicz 1986, 342. 55 We are grateful to Richard Brewer and Mark Lewis for this opportunity. 56 Nash-Williams 1931, 1932; Knight 2003, 43-8; Evans 2000. 57 Boon 1986, 273.
29
in the Isle of Purbeck, south-east Dorset (FIG.1).58The economy was based on industrial activities, especially the manufactureof items of stone, such as mortars, lathe-turnedshale bracelets, tesserae, and opus sectile.59 Stratifiedstone products appear from the first century A.D. but are chiefly found in a substantialdump of industrialwaste emplaced some time after A.D.296-7. There is no evidence of mosaics themselves at Norden. Some 1,500-2,000 loose chalk tesserae occurred at Norden in a context of late first-centuryA.D. date, whereas sawn slabs of this rock made their appearancefrom the second century. The lithology of particularinterest is described as 'a brown or black mudstone', suggested without evidence to be of local origin and to have 'possibly come from the [highest Jurassic] Purbeck Beds'; earlier, at Fishbourne, this material had similarly been claimed to be, amongst other things, 'a Jurassic, possibly Kimmeridge, shale'.60 A total of eight loose 'mudstone' tesserae were found at Norden, stratifiedin layers dating from the second to the fourth century A.D. Unstratifiedexamples were also encountered. Numbers of sawn slabs of 'mudstone' for inlay and other decorative purposes had a distributionfrom the late first to early second century (1), throughthe second (13) and stratigraphical late second to late thirdcenturies (7), to the late thirdto fourth century (8). A findspot c. 100 m to the south-west of the excavation yielded 20 'small grey cubes', presumably tesserae, of what had been described as 'a slightly calcareous siltstone'.61This may also be the 'mudstone' of the main site. No other lithologies are known as tesserae at Norden. Stonework described as from Norden and other representative material were examined at the The collections include one modulartessera (4.1 g) measuring Dorset County Museum, Dorchester.62 c. 12 mm along each side, and three double-tesserae (7.2-13.2 g), all on the large side compared to the correspondingforms at Insula IX, Silchester (FIG. 2A). The lithology in hand-specimen is a dark from a double-tessera revealed a A thin-section cementstone. effervescent yellowish-grey, weakly finely granulardolomite rock rich in translucent,brown, amorphousorganic matter,scatteredopaque 4F). A very little interstitial calcite was seen. organic material, and a little pyrite and quartz silt (FIG. Also present was a small fish bone and a few scales, and a plane-chambered foraminifera. Also with fish scales and a fragment of spinose (?)crustacean shell, a closely similar rock was apparent in thin-sections from two pieces of opus sectile. These preparationswere large enough to reveal a coarse lamination or fine banding created by variations in the amounts of amorphous and opaque organic material in the rock. A piece of opus sectile and a lump of unsawn, raw cementstone gave the mineralogical compositions listed in Table 2. These are closely comparableto the cementstone from the KimmeridgeClay Formation(FIG. 3C, Table2). An immatureDeltoidium, an Upper Jurassic oyster, occurs in mouldic preservation in one sawn piece, and the lump of raw material is also fossiliferous. This varied evidence leaves little doubt that the tesserae and opus sectile of 'mudstone' found at Norden were procured from dolomite cementstones in the Kimmeridge Clay Formation and not, as has been proposed,63from the highest Jurassic Purbeck Beds, which the rocks do not resemble. The nearest and most likely source is the outcrop on the coast of the Isle of Purbeck, as near as 6 km to the south-west of Corfe Castle. However, anothermudstone, apparentlyfrom the local Bagshot Beds (Tertiary),was used for tesserae at the waterside site of Ower, on the shores of Poole Harbour5.5 km to the north-eastof Norden.64As at Norden there was (rich) evidence of shale-working.
58 59 60 61 62 63 64
Sunter 1986. Thomas 1986. Thomas 1986, 35-6; Cunliffe 1971b, 41. Farrar1964; Sunter 1986, 11. Peter Woodward kindly facilitated this examination. Thomas 1986, 35-6. Woodward 1986.
30
J.R.L. ALLEN AND M.G. FULFORD DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
We summarise above a geological analysis of a selection of mosaic materials and decorative stonework at a range of the earliest Roman military and civil/public sites ranged across southern Britain. Because most of the materials involved are fine-grained, the work has necessarily and crucially demanded the application, wherever samples were available, of microscopic and mineralogical techniques. In one importantcase, critical palaeontological evidence was secured. The results link tesserae and mosaics across three insulae at Silchester, and lead to the expectation of the even wider use of the same components for decorative floors in the town. On a regional scale, they suggest that the same small range of geological materials - hard white chalk, dolomite cementstone, red burnt mudrock, and yellow burnt mudrock - was employed decoratively almost everywhere, from Kent to Devon to south-east Wales (FIG.1, Table 3). On the face of it, no geological evidence is hereby offered for the existence of mosaic 'schools' or 'groupings' at the early time we consider, but great caution is necessary on this particular issue. Because of the huge variation in sample size, the absence of a category at a site need not necessarily mean that it was not exploited there. The largest samples come from Insula IX at Silchester and from Fishbourne. Twenty-two categories of material are recognised at the former (Table 1), but these tesserae, being loose, could be analysed petrographicallyand mineralogically at will. At Fishbourne, apparentlywith a narrower range of materials, there are hugely more tesserae, but most are in mosaics subject to hand-lens inspection only. At the other extreme, a mere handful of material was available from some sites. As the evidence currently stands, the suite of widespread materials - dolomite cementstone and the two burntmudrocks (we have not attemptedto provenance the chalk)- was procured from the Kimmeridge Clay Formation of the Dorset coast. This Upper Jurassic unit has two main outcrops, aroundKimmeridge Bay in south-west Isle of Purbeck, and from Porteshamto Ringstead Bay to the north and east of Weymouth(FIG.1). A minor but coastal outcrop occurs on the east side of the Isle of Portland. An important question is where were these materials being processed into tesserae and opus sectile. Corfe Castle is only c. 6 km to the north-eastof Kimmeridge Bay and a similar distance from
TABLE 3. DISTRIBUTION OF MOSAIC MATERIALS BY CATEGORYAND SITE.
dolomite InsulaIX, Silchester Museum of Reading Mosaic 1 Museum of Reading Mosaic 2 Exeter FishbourneRoman Palace Eccles villa Angmering villa London (all sites) Caerleon Norden, Corfe Castle X X X X X X X X X X
yellow burnt mudrock X

-
red burnt mudrock X

-
'local' rocks' X X X X X X X X X X
imported marble -
ceramics X X
glass X
? X X ? X X X X ? X -
X -
X X X X
flint chalkandotherlimestones, Isandstones,
31
the shores of Poole Harbour,the focus of major late Iron Age-Roman industries that included the productionof a range of widely-traded products in stone. The evidence from Norden shows that the cementstone was being shaped there into both opus sectile and tesserae, but of the burnt mudrocks there is no known trace. Moreover, there is so far nothing to indicate that this workshop was intendedto serve a nearbybuilding under construction.At the builders' yard at Fishbourne, however, burnt mudrocks as well as the cementstone were being made into geometrical tiles and inlay using importedraw materials,apparentlyfor an adjacentbuilding, with tesserae of these rocks appearingin the slightly later palace mosaics. Lying c. 100 km to the east of the nearest possible sources of these rocks, Fishbourne is not a plausible site for a general manufactorywith a similar status to Norden. Most of the mosaics and materials which are well dated belong to the period between the mid-first century and the early second century A.D. There is a confident pre-Boudiccan attributionof what we now understandto be Kimmeridgian cementstone from London (Southwark), and it is not unlikely that the material from the legionary bath-house at Exeter pre-dates A.D. 60. The rock from the builders' working yard of the 'proto-palace' at Fishbourne,which includes coloured as well as black and white material, is of Neronian-early Flavian date,65while the best-dated floors are to be found at Fishbourneand Caerleon from c. A.D. 75. None of our examples has a terminuspost quem which is definitely after A.D. 100, but several are assigned a 'late first/early second century' date range. The secondary,Period III floor in Room N7 as excavated at Fishbourne,the celebrated 'Dolphin' mosaic, makes significant use of ceramic and limestone tesserae to produce colours ranging, in the case of the former,from bright red to reddish black, and yellow-orange in the case of the latter.This floor dates after c. A.D. 160 and the Kimmeridgian material is no longer dominant. This is also the case of the Period III floor in N13. Is this because Dorset rocks were no longer being exploited with the same intensity as before and were simply being recycled into new floors? Do the Period III floors provide a terminusante quem for the intensive exploitation of those materials? This chronological range compares well with that of the main period of production of Purbeck marblefor both monumentalinscriptions and decorative purposes, as used internally for opus sectile mouldings, wall inlay and furnitureinlay, and as used classically at Caerleon, Exeter, Fishbourne, London, and Silchester. Just as our latest mosaic floors with dominant Kimmeridgianmaterials have first century A.D. terminipost quos, so, with the exception of at least one tombstone, none of the independentlydated fragments of Purbeckmarble used for monumental inscriptions is later than the end of the first century A.D.66 Nevertheless, determining an end-date for the significant exploitation of both Purbeck marble and our Kimmeridgian rocks for building purposes is not straightforward.Mosaics aside, most of the tesserae we describe occur out of their original context, and it is usually difficult to distinguish between a piece which has been discarded fresh from working into a primary context associated with construction and one which has been recycled for a new floor or discarded as rubbish following demolition of a building. Sometimes the survival of signs of wear or of adhering mortar may give a clue as to whether a tessera has been used, but surfaces can become softened and rounded, and calcareous matter dissolved, as the result of weathering at a site. This issue is brought sharply into focus by ornamental stonework in London.67Of 56 examples of Purbeck marble from first- and third-centuryA.D. contexts, more than half (31) are from those dated '2nd+, 3rd and 3rd+', and only one of these was found in situ in a second-century A.D. bath-house.68A similar picture is presented for early finds of 'Wealden shale' opus sectile (Kimmeridgian cementstone), where six of the eight
65 Although Cunliffe (1971a, 63) only notes a black and white mosaic fragment and white tesserae from this Period IC First Masonry Building. 66 Dunning 1949; Frere and Fulford 2002, 173; for a general summary of the use of Purbeck marble in Roman Britain, see Williams 2002. 67 Pritchard 1986. 68 Pritchard 1986, 169-71.
32
examples stratified over the same time range are from third-centuryA.D. and later contexts.69 It is clearly improbableto suppose rising productionof Purbeckmarble and Kimmeridgianmaterial long after the main phase of building which requiredthese materials had ceased by about the mid-second We returnto the issue of the end-date of production below. century A.D.70 In recognising the close proximity of the sources of Purbeck marble and the Kimmeridgian materials, we should not overlook the question of the provenance of the chalk tesserae. Our prior hypothesis, however, is that, in large measure at least, and in the early period of mosaic manufacture, they, too, were procured from the coast, as has been suggested for Exeter, Fishbourne, and Norden, but proof must await extensive micropalaeontological work beyond the scope of this paper. Altogether, the Kimmeridgian rocks of Dorset, probably in their coastal outcrops, provided the essential, if minimal, range of materials with their associated colours for the interior decor of military, public, and private buildings.71 These could be - and were - supplemented in small quantities at individual sites by other lithologies, some comparatively local but others, marbles in particular,possibly from overseas (Table 3). As we note above, at Silchester (Insula IX), Fishbourne, London (Winchester Palace), Eccles, and Caerleon, rock plausibly from nearby sources (e.g. Lias at Caerleon) was being used alongside the predominant, far-travelled materials from Dorset. At Angmering, however, the supplements may have come partly or wholly from overseas. Our conclusion that there was a 'package' of quality building materials available from a restricted geographical area raises questions about the organisation of production and distribution. Present evidence suggests that there was a workshop at Corfe Castle producing cementstone opus sectile and tesserae for general distribution, but that raw cementstone and burnt mudrock were brought a considerable distance to be worked up at one building site, that of the 'proto-palace' at Fishbourne. The workshop at Norden arguablydrew raw material from the nearby Kimmeridge Bay outcrop (FIG. 1). Fishbourneneed not have been supplied from there but could have drawn upon the Kimmeridge Clay Formation at Ringstead Bay to the west, although the upper part of the Formation is less well-exposed here. That tesserae of burnt mudrocks are widespread, and that opus sectile in these materialsis not confined to Fishbourne,suggests that there was somewhere at least one workshop that exploited, or even restricteditself to, the mudrocks. Hence a model of dispersed productionincluding both the initial quarryingand the subsequent shaping of the stone seems at present apposite. How far shaping of the tesserae was driven by fashion as opposed to workshop tradition requires much furtherinvestigation, but we can detect slight differences in modularitybetween Eccles, Fishbourne, and Silchester which might hint at different workshops or artists. There are clearly significant organisational implications in co-ordinating the quarrying and working of the range of geological materials which were being deployed in a number of building programmes across southern Britain, from legionary fortresses to high-status villas, town-houses and other, quite modest urbanbuildings such as the timber-framedstructuresin London west of the Walbrookor in Southwark.These materials were thus available at all levels of society - military, public, and private - that were capable of exploiting or affording them. While there might have been an issue about the availability of the coloured stones of reds and yellows (we note, for example, the use of samian for red at Exeter), it is difficult to know whether this was driven in part at least by a preference for bichrome floors. The mixed patternof working the material to the desired shape both near the geological origin, as at Norden, and at the point of consumption, as at Fishbourne, is reminiscent of the patternof working of Kimmeridge shale from the Iron Age and through the Roman period. Several settlement sites on
69 Pritchard 1986, 186. 70 For London, see Perring 1991; a more general survey of towns appears in Wacher 1995. 71 For Romano-British settlements associated with the working of Purbeck marble in south-east Dorset, see RCHME 1970, 602-13.
33
the Isle of Purbeck yielded waste from the lathe-turningof shale to produce armlets72and similar waste is also found at sites, such as Silchester, remote from the geological origin.73While this might be seen as evidence of a continuity of tradition of working from Iron Age into Roman, it has to be rememberedthat the shale was used not for building but for other purposes, including ornamentation of the body. The exploitation of Kimmeridgian cementstones and burnt mudrocks, Purbeck marble and chalk for interior decor, including walls and floors, appears to have been a purely 'Roman' innovation after A.D.43. The sheer volume of material demanded for major projects, like the fitting out of a bath-house as at Exeter or Caerleon, or of major villas like the Neronian-Flavianbuildings at Fishbourne,suggests a different kind and level of organisation. For example, given the modular size (Silchester), and allowing for mortar,a single mosaic floor of 25 m2 requires c. 200,000 tesserae amounting to half a metric tonne of preparedrock. The consequential waste could well have been several times that amount. It is striking that the industry was capable of supplying these quantities of material to such a wide variety of destinations at more or less the same (archaeological) time and with little need to look elsewhere for additional resources. Distance does not seem to have affected availability (and cost) across the breadthof southernBritain. The organisationalleap from simply supplying shale for mostly personal and ornamentalpurposes to the deployment of building materials representsa stepchange. Like metals such as lead and iron, such resources were part of the emperor's domain and, in the case of the south-east Dorset exploitation, were presumably mediated through the procurator and/orLegion II. Whetherthese materialswere made available at 'market'prices can only be guessed at, but both their distributionin modest as well as grandestablishments,and their competitive success suggest some form of subsidy. In the case of mosaics in particular,a number of options, including the use of both ceramics and glass, representeda realistic, accessible and, partly at least, satisfactory alternative.Provision of decorative building materialsat subsidised prices may have been a deliberate way of assisting the native aristocraciesto become 'Roman'. Alternatively,attractiveloans may have made the acquisition of these materialsirresistible.Although the process of exploitation begins before Boudicca, it continues in the Flavian period and into the second century A.D. In the latter contexts, this representsthe kind of encouragementthat Tacitus credits Agricola with in his exhortationto the natives to build templa,fora, domos.74 In the former, however, and in contrast, the acquisition of decorative stone may have been one of the factors which pushed the aristocracy into too much debt and encouragedthe calling-in of loans in the late 50s priorto the Boudiccan revolt.75 One furtherreason for reflecting on the agency responsible for the exploitation and supply is that, if an official activity, its duration and intensity may bear no relation to the scale of demand for the materials.Although determining the end-date for supply is hard, not least because of the possibility of re-use in later mosaics, it is worth recalling the major change that took place in south-east Dorset activity in the early second century A.D. The archaeological record reveals a very significant expansion in the productionand distributionof black-burnishedtype pottery (SEDBB 1) from around the shores of Poole Harbourfrom the reign of Hadrianin the 120s and onwards.76The scale of this production is not insignificant and it could be connected with the exploitation of salt. It is tempting, therefore,to see a connection between the decline in the exploitation of Kimmeridgianrocks, Purbeck marble,and chalk from south-east Dorset and the expansion of the pottery industryand, possibly, salt extraction. Such a substitution could be effected by making use of and redeploying elements of the local population from stone exploitation to pottery- and salt-making, and by redirectingthe transport system. For both to have operated concurrentlythrough the second and into the third centuries A.D.
72 RCHME 1970, 499, 510, 597-602, 604, 608-9, 620-1; Sunter 1986; Woodward 1986. 73 Lawson 1975, 256.
74 Agricola 21.
75 Dio Cassius 62.2. 76 Allen and Fulford 1996.
34
has significant implications for settlement and population in south-east Dorset and elsewhere in Britain.77 Finally, we returnto the tesserae and the floors made from them. Apart from some near-pristine Period II mosaics at Fishbourne,little more than fragmentsof floors survive from elsewhere, but, with one well preservedborder in black and white, it is appropriateat least to add the Insula XIX mosaic from Silchester to the numberof early mosaics from Britain; the latter should also include the wellpreservedbichrome floor from House 1 in Insula XIV. In this situation where little has survived it is difficult, as we note, to define schools, let alone groupingsof style or workshops,thoughan expectation of several firms operating across southern Britain in the later first and early second century A.D. is attractive.The indicative scale of consumption at London and Silchester alone would argue for the probabilityof multiple workshops or groups of itinerantcraftsmen.The occurrenceof particulartraits, such as the size and shaping of the tesserae and the selection of certain materials, for example, the consistent choice of samian for red at legionary Exeter,may provide pointers towardthe identification of workshops. On the other hand, the evidence from Exeter, Eccles, Angmering, and Caerleon hints in the case of bath-houses at a utilitarianpreference for double-tesserae set on end, perhaps as a protectionagainst seeping damp.The image, admittedlyheavily weighted by the Period II examples at of bichromefloors in the earliest phase of mosaic-makingin Britain. Fishbourne,is of a preponderance However, the presence of coloured materialin abundanceat the Neronian-earlyFlavianbuilders'yard, and its incidence at Silchester from later first- and second-centuryA.D. contexts and floors, suggests that the ratio of polychrome to bichrome was greaterthan is implied by those early fragmentswhich have survived. Equally,even if we cannotbe confidentof an association with an actualpavement in the pre-Boudiccanperiod, the presence of the materialsthemselves is strong, indirectconfirmationof the presence of pre-Flavianmosaics in fortress,town and country in early Roman Britain.
PALAEONTOLOGICALNOTE
By J.A. Todd and N.J. Morris78 The fossiliferous material we have examined comprises three centimetre-scale fragments from Insula IX, Silchester, and a decimetre-scale lump of raw material excavated at Fishbourne,probably from the builders' yard associated with the Neronian-Flavian 'proto-palace'. Although with marine fossils, notably oyster spat and fish bones (especially skull bones) of broadly Mesozoic-Tertiary age, the two cementstone tesserae (lithology La) from Insula IX yielded nothing of any precise stratigraphicalsignificance, and are not considered further. The piece of burnt red mudrock from Insula IX (lithology Mc) gave several fossils in largely mouldic preservation with occasional baked adherent shell carbonate. We found two compressed specimens of small heterodont bivalve mollusc, but without details of the hinge or ligament; one external mould of a pteriomorphbivalve, probably an ostreoid oyster; two fragments of gastropod shell with striate and nodose sculpture; and one rugose shell fragment, probably from a bivalve mollusc. The small bivalves are similar in shape to forms that occur particularly from the Jurassic onwards. The ostreoid (true) oysters and high-spired gastropods with ornamentationsimilar to that observed (superfamily Cerithioidea) are compatible with the age-range suggested by the heterodont bivalves. Of greater stratigraphicalvalue is the large, fragmentary lump of burnt red mudrock (lithology Mc) from Fishbourne.This preserves the external mould of an incomplete large ammonite and c. 10 isolated valves, whole and fragmentary,of bivalves present as internalor external moulds with baked shell present.Also present in mouldic preservationare at least two moderately high-spired gastropod
77 cf. Allen and Fulford 1996, 251-61; note also the logistics associated with the contemporary construction of Hadrian's Wall in Kendal 1996. 78 Both authors are of The Natural History Museum, London.
BRITAIN MATERIALS IN SOUTHERN EARLY ROMAN MOSAIC
35
shells. The amount of detail preserved on the ammonite allows it to be confidently attributed to the genus Pectinatites Buckman, of the family Perisphinctidae. The gastropods belong to a species characterised by its sharply carinate spire whorls and a final whorl that is bicarinate with a long, thin and curved anterior canal. These features allow a confident identification as Dicroloma Gabb, an apporhaidgastropod ranging from Early to Late Jurassic, and in Britain commonly found in the The ovate bivalves are poorly preserved and are Oxford Clay and Kimmeridge Clay Formations.79 difficult to identify with confidence, but a few specimens show on the hinge a bifid cardinal tooth and traces of long anterior and posterior lateral teeth, confirming that they are heterodonts. With their smooth ventral margin, small size (length 5 mm), and very fine concentrically-ribbedornament, these bivalves probably belong to the genus Isocyprina (Venericyprina) of the family Arcticidae. About five species are known from the English Kimmeridgian Stage,so and the Fishbourne material is comparablewith I. (V.) miniscula Blake of the Upper Kimmeridgian of South-WestEngland. Only the Fishbourne sample provides a tightly-constrained age and our conclusions are based largely on this material.The occurrenceof the narrow-rangingammonitePectinatites shows lithology Mc at the Fishbourne Palace builders' yard to be of Lower Volgian age in the Upper Jurassic, and fully supports the proposal, reached on other grounds explained in the main text, that this burnt mudrock comes from the (upper) Kimmeridge Clay Formation. In South-West England, as typified by the Kimmeridge Bay outcrop (FIG.1 above), the gastropod Dicroloma and the bivalve Isocyprina (Venericyprina)are both common in and characteristicof the upperKimmeridge Clay Formation.The Silchester fragment is likely to have the same provenance, for the heterodontbivalves may represent Isocyprina and the cerithioid gastropod fragments have a morphology entirely consistent with those members of the Procerithiidae which can occur abundantly in the Kimmeridge Clay Formation. It is interesting to note that, under today's conditions, the upper Kimmeridge Clay Formation is best exposed on the coast to the east of Kimmeridge Bay in the Isle of Purbeck.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
the help and interestof manypeople who generouslyallowedus access to sites We gratefullyacknowledge and materialin their charge:JohnAllan (Royal Albert Museum& Art Gallery,Exeter),RichardBrewer Jill Greenaway RebeccaFardell(Littlehampton (Museum Museum), (NationalMuseum& Gallery,Cardiff), of London),MarkLewis (RomanLegionary Jennifer Hall (Museum of Reading), Museum, Caerleon),Susan
Pringle (Museum of London), David Neal (Milton Keynes), David Rudkin (Fishbourne Roman Palace,
andPeterWoodward of London), JohnShepherd Dorchester). (DorsetCountyMuseum, (Museum Chichester), on sites of burningin Jurassicshales of IanWest(Universityof Southampton) kindlyprovidedinformation for help, andto BruceSellwoodfor valuablecomments the Dorsetcoast. We aregratefulto KevinHayward We are indebtedto our colleaguesMichaelAndrewsand John on some of the rarelithologiesat Silchester. with great skill from mostly very Jackfor respectivelymineralogical analysesand thin-sectionsprepared smallsamples.Especialthanksgo to JonToddandNoel Morris(TheNaturalHistoryMuseum,London)for theirrichpalaeontological findingsfromourvery limitedmaterial. Department ofArchaeology, School of Human and EnvironmentalSciences, University of Reading m.g.fulford@reading.ac.uk j.r.l.allen@reading.ac.uk Thispaper is published with the aid of a grant from the University of Reading
79 Wignall 1990, 9, 11-12; Hollingworth 1991, 80-1. 80 Clausen and Wignall 1988, 131-6.
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ALLEN AND M.G.FULFORD J.R.L. BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Williams, D.F. 2002: 'Purbeck marble in Roman and medieval Britain', in D.A. Hinton (ed.), Purbeck Papers, University of Southampton Department of Archaeology Monograph 4, 126-31 Wilson, A.E. 1947: 'Angmering Roman villa', Sussex Archaeol. Coll. 86, 1-21 Woodward, P.J. 1986: 'The excavation of a Late Iron-Age settlement and Romano-British industrial site at Ower, Dorset', in P.J. Woodward (ed.), Romano-British Industries in Purbeck, Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society Monograph 6, Dorchester, 44-124, 180-4 Zienkiewicz, J.D. 1986: The Legionary Fortress Baths at Caerleon, Cardiff

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Early Roman Mosaic Materials in Southern Britain, with Particular Reference to Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum): A Regional Geological Perspective

Materials with Particular Silchester

(Calleva A trebatum): Regional Geological Perspective

one of the best knownart forms in the Romanworld.Theirgeometric represent

J.R.L. ALLEN AND M.G. FULFORD

KEY TO SITES 0 towns * civil/public * military

Angmering Exeter CorfeCastle Fishbourne Kimmeridge Bay .Kimmeridge CHANN I

Ringstead Boy Isle of Portland

Outcrops of Cloy Formation

Clarke and Fulford 2002.