Ekaterina Shablavina
Technique production of the Gothic jewelries in the 5-7th century AD
The main purpose of the work is an acquaintance and research of archaeological materials dealing with the Gothic history and relationships with Western Roman Empire and Byzantium, jewelry production, as well as scientific literature devoted to this period. The flowering of this time was the Ostrogothic Kingdom under the reign of Theodoric the Great.
The theme of the project is “Technique production of the Gothic jewelries in the 5-7th century AD” with traceology method. There were found a lot of jewelry of Gothic and local population in Bosporus necropolis. The present research deals with the preparation of the monograph "Jewelry production on the Bosphorus in early medieval period".
In the Hermitage collection of the Bosporus antiquities there are some items of the Gothic population and residents woman`s and man`s clothing (eagle-head buckles, finger-shaped fibulas, radiate-head brooches and bi-plated fibulas, details of the belts and golden earrings). Traditionally the prototypes of the Bosporos jewelries were just Central European things, which are stored now at the Italian museums. Technically this statement is not confirmed. The study of the producing technique of the objects by traceology method is allowed to determine and compare the presence of the producing continuity between the Bosporos and the Central European antiquities.
During my stay in Italy I have worked at the Library Ariostea of Ferrara and at the library of the Castelvecchio museum of Verona. Also I attended monuments and museums of Ferrara (the National Archaeological Museum), Ravenna ( the basilicum of Sant’ Appolinare in Classe, Sant’ Appolinare Nuovo, San Vitale, the mausoleum of Galla Placidia, the Cathedral Baptistry, the Cathedral, the Archiepiscopal museum and Chapel, the church of Saint John The Evangelist, the palace of Theodoric, the mausoleum of Theodoric, the National Museum), Bologna (the Archaeological Museum), Venice (the National Archaeological Museum), Turin (the Museum of Antiquities, the Museo Cicico d'Arte Antica), Reggio Emilia (the Civico Museo Chierici di Paletnologia), Verona (the Castelvecchio museum, the Archaeological museum), Florence (the Archaeological Museum) and I researched some archaeological collection of early medieval period from above-listed museums. The objects are studied with traceology method. On the items different traces of tools, working operations and repairs can be found. In the course of the work I have made detailed morphological and tracological description and took a macro photography of every item examined. These descriptions are a part of the catalogue of early medieval objects. The overall amount of archeological objects I have analyzed is about 150. Thus, the involvement of Italian archaeological collections is a major contribution to the research of Bosporos jewelry production of early medieval period. Useful contacts with Italian colleagues, who studied similar questions were got during my probation.
The result of probation
A combination of archaeological material with data of iconography and writing sources allows to get the most complete information of material culture early medieval period and to reconstruct the jewelry production. Numismatic material (collection of Domenico Paskualigo and hoard of Saint Toma (Venice)), carved bone art (Bologna, Ravenna) as well as mosaics of Ravenna give a clear idea of Ostrogothic costume V century A.D. (Theodoric Kingdom) and Byzantine costume VI century A.D. (The Ustinian reign). Jewelry objects, which depict on these clothes, represent the archaeological finds from the territory of Italy (Desana hoard, Reggio Emilia hoard, Izola Rica hoard, some finds from the territory of Turin, Bologna and others).
In the result of the technological analysis of micro traces on the items (eagle-head buckles, finger-shaped fibulas, details of the belts, bracelets and golden earrings with polyhedral bead) were distinguished and reconstructed stages and methods production of the items and determined the level of jewelry craftsmanship. Detected technical features of the Gothic items allow to compare with the similar category items, which origin from another territory of Western (Germany, France) and Eastern (the Crimea, the Middle Dnieper region) Europe.
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Pict.1 Finger-shaped fibulas |
Thus, on the Bosporus in the early medieval period the serial production of objects were accomplished by casting with metallic samples for fibulae and buckles. As we ascertained, several craftsmen worked here at different times. The earliest production of the one craftsman are the series 1 and 4 of finger-shaped fibulas (the end of V – the first half of VI century A.D.). Later another craftsman produced the series 2 and 6 of finger-shaped fibulas, which appeared on the Bosporus at the last quarter of V – the first half of VI century A.D (pict. 1).
The products of the third craftsman, who began to work here at the second thirds of VI century A.D. are silver fibulas, known as Aquilea type (series 3), eagle-head buckles, silver bracelets and the heraldic belt-fittings.
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| Pict.2 Eagle-head buckles |
At the last stage of existence the Bosporus it were brass items, which were made by the forth craftsman by means of making copies from the originals and earlier jewelry objects (pict. 2). Among the Bosporan local production of items are distinguished the objects (buckles, fibulaes, earrings) imported from the Western Europe and the South-Western Crimea, which was made by casting with metallic samples. As for the method of serial production, this technique was typical for manufacture of German tribes of Western Europe.
In addition of my work I prepared for publication the article «The technique production of golden earrings with polyhedral bead from the South-Western burials ground of early medieval period».