BMCR 2009.03.08, Catherine Abadie-Reynal, La ce/ramique romaine d'Argos

Catherine Abadie-Reynal, La ce/ramique romaine d'Argos (fin du IIe s.
av. J.-C.-fin du IVe s. ap. J.-C.). E/tudes pe/loponne/siennes, 13.
Athens:  E/cole franc,aise d'Athe\nes, 2007.  Pp. 342; pls. 78.  ISBN
2-86958-200-5.  EUR 110.00 (pb).

Reviewed by Kathleen Warner Slane, University of Missouri
([email protected])
Word count:  2221 words
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To read a print-formatted version of this review, see
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2009/2009-03-08.html
To comment on this review, see
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[Table of Contents are listed at the end of the review.]

This book presents the Roman pottery from the excavations carried out
in Argos between 1953 and 1984 (and some more recently published
materials) by the French School at Athens. In the introduction
Abadie-Reynal explains that the chronological termini are set by both
political events, not specified, and by ceramic changes: the
introduction of Eastern Sigillata A in the late second century BC and
the appearance of eastern products suddenly available in Greece at the
end of the fourth century after Christ. She has catalogued some 3500
pieces from the larger quantity of pottery available for study. For the
fine wares her goal was to present a good cross-section; the common
wares selected for publication represent useful stratigraphic contexts.
In a final, thought-provoking chapter the author summarizes patterns of
import, use, and deposition and connects them to such evidence as
building forms, dining habits, and cuisine to sketch a picture of
cultural changes in Roman Argos. The last 50 pages provide a list of
the contents of the 48 context-groups from which the catalogue was
drawn. In addition to plates of profiles, there are two color plates of
the main clay types found at Argos, including 6 used for local fine
wares (1-6) and two cooking fabrics (16 and 19) predominant at both
Argos and Corinth.

In the 1970s the excavators of many eastern sites turned their
attention to the Roman phases of those sites: in addition to Argos and
Corinth, Knossos, Labraunda and Ephesos in Asia, Stobi in Macedonia,
Benghazi in Cyrenaica, and a little later Gortyna on Crete. On Greek
sites "Roman" was understood broadly to extend from the defeat of the
Achaian League in 146 BC or the Sullan destruction in 87/86 to Alaric's
invasion in 396, followed by "Late Roman" (often assigned to another
specialist) until the late sixth century. At each site the problems
were the same: to define the fabrics, types, and chronological
parameters of the imported fine wares in order to date local monuments
and, eventually, add another chapter to the history of the site. Some
studies also included (mostly local) cooking pots and plain wares, but
this effort has been hampered by the fact that so much had already been
discarded. Other work in progress with a wide chronological span
includes the second part of Robinson's Athenian Agora volume by John
Hayes (the imported fine wares were published in January 2009 as
Athenian Agora XXXII; another volume on the common ware is in
preparation), the Roman pottery from Isthmia also being studied by
Hayes, my own work on the pottery from east of the Theater at Corinth,
pottery from Olympia being studied by Christa Schauer and Archer
Martin, and pottery from Sparta being studied by Clare Pickersgill.
Studies of single deposits or phases have proliferated.

The Argos volume is an excellent addition to these studies. The picture
of Argos that emerges is of a self-sufficient city little affected by
outside events (or trade) from the second century BC until the Flavian
period. Construction of several monumental buildings of both Greek and
Roman types and an increased level of imports attest that the first
half of the second century after Christ was a prosperous period. There
was little building construction either in the first century BC or
between the mid second century and the late fourth, and hence there are
few deposits for these periods. Abadie-Reynal argues, however, that
Argive prosperity continued well into the fourth century until the
monumental buildings in the agora were destroyed. As elsewhere in the
Peloponnesos destruction by the Herulians c. 267 is hardly apparent in
Argos, and the causes of the "late fourth/early fifth century"
destruction, or if it was a single event, are not discussed (the
implication is that it was Alaric rather than earlier earthquakes).

For each ware, category and type, Abadie-Reynal provides a count of the
number available for study. The identifications are accurate and can be
depended upon. Each catalogue entry contains (in addition to the usual
data of inventory number, form, ware, dimensions, and additional
examples) a brief essay on the dated contexts and other criteria of
interest for the sherd (such as the potter for Italian sigillata). At
the end of each imported fine ware description she has provided a
critical analysis of the occurrence of the ware at Argos and elsewhere
in Greece or the East (and at Belo with which she is also very
familiar). These are very useful and are the first of their kind in
French. Beyond the catalogue and immediate discussion, the book also
provides a modern description and illustrations of about 20 of the main
Argive and other common-ware fabrics (pp. 186-187). My single
organizational complaint is that the common wares, which include the
local and regional fine wares, are presented by form rather than by
fabric. The result is that some interesting data are not very obvious:
only two pieces of LR Attic are catalogued, 310 and 326; 358, 368, 373
and possibly 376 are the "local" cooking pots and 393-399 the pitchers
typical of the NE Peloponnesos.

Tip for using the catalogue: the catalogue entries are numbered in a
running series and illustrated examples are catalogue #1, catalogue #2
etc. always in bold face. These numbers are useful for finding
illustrations in the plates and are also listed for each context.
Preceding the catalogue number is a complex number in plain font that
designates the form; it includes a group number for the ware, a number
for the general form, and a third number for the specific variant so
form 4.1.11 designates an Italian sigillata plate of Conspectus form
18, form 6.2.7 an Eastern Sigillata A hemispherical bowl of Atlante
form 22A, form 17.1.1 an LRC/Phocaean Red Slip ware dish of Hayes form
1. Numbers beginning with 20 are for the common wares and 30 designates
the amphoras, both in chapter 2. These numbers are listed in the
section on context groups but not in the individual ware-essays in
chapter 1. In the descriptions of the context groups the published
sherds listed under dating evidence are those listed by form and count
under summary of pottery.

The picture given by the fine wares is familiar from other Greek sites.
Black-glazed ware come from Campania but also from eastern sources, and
local production persists until the middle of the first century after
Christ (299). ESA (154 vessels) is the first significant red-ware
import and dominates at least through the Augustan period. Italian
sigillata (212 vessels plus a piece of South Gaulish relief ware)
characterizes the middle and second half of the first century contexts,
and some of the second-century stamps found elsewhere in southern
Greece are also found at Argos (Oct. Pro., LRP etc).. Eastern wares
become dominant again from the Flavian period: ESB (393 vessels) in the
last quarter of the first century and second, C,andarli (628 vessels,
37% of all the fine ware) throughout the second and into the third
century. African Red Slip ware is relatively uncommon (190 vessels,
mostly fourth century, 6 dateable to the second), and 25 pieces of Late
Roman C are dated in the fourth century, 15% of the fine-ware of that
time. Abadie-Reynal argues that the fourth-century western imports
reflect the growing importance of Constantinople in empire-wide trade.

To me one of the most interesting features of the Argive ceramics is
that the "local" cooking fabric is actually a regional product, as
Abadie-Reynal stresses. Cooking pot forms (356, 358, 368, 373 and
possibly 376), a flanged bowl 327, a one-handled mug and other pitchers
(330, 393-396, 399), and even some amphoras (438, 439, perhaps some of
440) are as local in Argos as they are in Corinth. They are also the
types found in Nemea, Berbati, Epidauros, and Isthmia, but the cooking
pots of Sikyon and Stymphalos are from a different source, although
related. The table amphora 327, cf. also 439, on the other hand, which
I would have also placed in this group, seems to be an Argive product.
Abadie-Reynal is surely correct to look for production of the cooking
fabric somewhere on the north eastern coast of the Peloponnesos, a
center which supplied both cities from the second or first century BC
into at least the fifth century after Christ. (This regional source is
not the source that supplied Corinth with Classical or Byzantine
cooking pots). We are reaching a point in the province of Achaia where
regional production of cooking pots and containers can be recognized
and sub-regions defined. It is my impression that regionalism on this
scale was exceptional in the Roman world.

My single fundamental problem with the book arises from the fact that
Abadie-Reynal's study has been constrained by an historical and
stratigraphic assumption that the agora of Argos was destroyed by
Alaric c. 396 and by what I take to be the practice of assigning levels
broadly across the Argive agora. This is implied in her descriptions of
contexts (group 43 and elsewhere) and made explicit in a recent article
by Askold Ivantchik on a late well.[[1]] The titles of the book and
article show that the dividing line between "Roman" and "early
Christian" has been set c. 400. Level III represents the last phase of
the agora ending with the destruction by Alaric, i.e., the destruction
debris; surface IV seals the preceding phase. In fact, what
Abadie-Reynal reports for that phase is three groups (34, 36 and 38,
the last two with contamination) with termini ante quem c. 300. These
represent a series of sand layers in the agora, a third-century
destruction debris underlying surface IV, and the dumped fill over
group 28 beside the theater. Deposits 36 and 38 are the most abundant
groups published here, and both have some later contamination; as
Abadie-Reynal makes clear, they have many parallels at Corinth in the
published "Tetrarchic" deposit, in the destruction of the east of
Theater buildings, and among unpublished groups. Abadie-Reynal dates
the groups that contain LRC (42-45 and 47) in the early fifth century
or c. 400 but this is a lower limit: they may be dated anytime in the
first half of the fifth century before LRC form 3 appears c. 450 or
later. The succeeding ceramic phase was illustrated in the recent
article by Ivantchik publishing an early Christian well in the Argive
agora; he expressly dates the destruction of the agora to Alaric and
states that the material in his well, the earlier part dated 400-425,
the later 425-500, is parallel to the use deposit in another agora
well, which is Abadie-Reynal's group 48 (cf. also 47) In my opinion
these dates are too early and the effect is to compress a lot of
fifth-century material into the fourth century. Abadie-Reynal is
explicit that all examples of LRC form 2 are found in contexts of the
fifth century or later, but a few examples of form 1 seem to be
transitional from C,andarli. Recent work in Corinth confirms that LRC
forms 1 and 2 are prevalent in the first half, perhaps even second
quarter of the fifth century, rather than in the fourth.[[2]]
Furthermore, imported cooking pots like 372, of which 5 examples are
listed in group 47, are dated by us mid-fifth to early sixth century
(Late Roman micaceous Aegean cooking ware). The effect in Corinth has
been to give new prominence to the fifth century and leave us wondering
about Alaric.

Despite the lower chronological limit stated in the book's title then,
the book contains a lot of fifth-century pottery. In addition to the
LRC and the Late Roman micaceous Aegean cooking form 372 listed in the
preceding paragraph, one can add form 377 of the same fabric, probably
371 and 375 of a similar ware that may appear at the end of the fourth
century, and the latest examples of the imported pan 374. Many of the
illustrated amphoras are also fifth to sixth-century types and the
evidence that they appear before 400 is tenuous at best. The following
amphoras are found either as contamination in group 38 or in groups
dated no earlier than the fifth century: 444?, 445 Calabrian or
Sicilian wine amphora, 447.1 the late version of a Niederbieber 77, 452
Late Roman Amphora 1 (aside from group 38, the earliest example at
Argos is from the Ivantchik well), 453 two-handled micaceous water jars
that do not appear at Argos earlier than group 48, 456, and 461 large
spatheion first appearing in group 45; also 455 a regional type in
groups 47 and 48. Very few amphoras in this volume are dateable to the
second to fourth centuries.

Table of Contents


Introduction 3


List of abbreviations 7


Chapter I The Fine Wares 13-181
Campanian, other black glazed wares, relief bowls, Italian and late
Italian sigillata, Gaulish sigillata, eastern sigillata A and B, ESC or
C,andarli, Cypriot sigillata, Pontic sigillata, thin-walled wares,
lead-glazed ware, Pompeiian red ware, Corinthian relief bowls, other
moldmade vessels, African red slip ware, Phocaean red slip ware (called
LRC in the above review)
A concordance linking the typology to the principal published
typologies 179-181.


Chapter 2 The Plain and Cooking Wares 185-254
Common pottery divided by shapes 185-237
Amphoras 237-254.

Conclusions 255


Appendices
Graffiti and dipinti 273-274
Analysis of contexts 275-322.

Bibliography 323

Plates 343


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Notes:


1.   A. I. Ivantchik, "Un puits de l'e/poque pale/ochre/tienne sur
l'agora d'Argos," BCH 126, 2002, pp. 331-413, especially pp. 332-340.

2.   Kathleen Warner Slane and Guy D. R. Sanders, "Corinth: Late Roman
Horizons," Hesperia 74, 2005, pp. 243-297; see now also Kathleen Warner
Slane, "The End of the Sanctuary of Demeter on Acrocorinth, Hesperia
77, 2008, pp. 465-496.