Abstract:

There are ten glass bowls in the Samsun Museum, included in the museum inventory through salvage excavation, confiscation or purchase. These are generally produced by using mould casting and free blowing techniques. Regarding their formal characteristics, they fall into three categories: floral motif-groove decorated, conical and hemispherical. Except for two unembellished pieces, all are decorated with groove or groove decorations. Two bowls with floral motif-groove decoration found in-situ during salvage excavations are distinguished from the others by the decoration technique. Examination of the technical features of these items reveals that the artefacts were produced by a mould casting technique and shaped with the help of a tool. This type of glass is one of the luxury glass vessels, a continuation of the tradition of emulating metal that started with the Persian Empire in the 6th century BC. Survey reports ceramic samples of this type of glass artefacts used in important glass production centres such as Alexandria, Cyprus, Syria and Rhodos during the Hellenistic Period. These artefacts are found in-situ as gifts for the dead in an underground-carved chamber tomb in Amisos. Although other artefacts were brought to the museum by purchase or confiscation, most of which are typical examples of the Roman Period. The difference from the Hellenistic period samples in terms of form, decoration and production technique must be due to the Period characteristics. No solid evidence of a glass production house has yet been found in Amisos nor its immediate surroundings. However, considering the density of glassworks in the region, we can argue that these findings hint at an unveiled glass production plant to be discovered.

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