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Communication Dans Un Congrès Année : 2022

Blue and white glass vessels and equivalents in Europe in the 10th-12th century CE

Inès Pactat
Bernard Gratuze

Résumé

First considered as antique, the blue and white glasses found on elite and religious sites between the 10th and 12th centuries CE contrast with the contemporaneous glass productions, using wood or plant ash as flux. Although they are natron glasses, the forms and the contexts of discovery are typical of the Middle Ages. Their manufacture is based on the recycling of mosaic tesserae and perhaps ancient coloured vessels, a process described in the 12th century treatise of the monk Theophilus, De Diversis artibus. The decoration of these specific glass vessels plays with the contrast between a translucent blue body and opaque white trails and droplets. White vessels with a vivid coloured decoration and others with the same decoration associated to a purple or a green body belong to the same group. We offer here an overview of findings, including unpublished data, to discuss the significance of their large distribution, from Norway to Italy. These glass vessels seem to share the same symbolism, which makes sense over a very huge territory among religious and secular elites. Their manufacturing process also certainly gives them a special value. It will be discussed using archaeometric data and compared to other recipes in use at that time. Blue and white glass vessels and their equivalents are part of a common material culture covering most of the medieval Europe. Their interpretation constitutes an archaeological and a historical challenge to understand the diffusion of goods and/or knowledge across these various territories.
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Dates et versions

hal-03980693 , version 1 (09-02-2023)

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  • HAL Id : hal-03980693 , version 1

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Inès Pactat, Bernard Gratuze. Blue and white glass vessels and equivalents in Europe in the 10th-12th century CE. 28th Annual Meeting of European Association of Archaeologists, Aug 2022, Budapest (HO), Hungary. ⟨hal-03980693⟩
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