Stamps on Terra Sigillata Found in Excavations of the Theatre of Aptera, Crete

by: Baldwin Bowsky, M.W.

Stamps on Terra Sigillata Found in Excavations of the Theatre of Aptera presents a group of stamped fragments of Italian and eastern sigillata found in excavations of the Theatre of Aptera (Crete). A total of 258 stamped sherds have been discovered and identified: 28 already published by the author and another 230 included here. Aptera now yields more stamped fragments of terra sigillata than any other Cretan city to date, including Knossos.

The sigillata stamps from the Theatre of Aptera can be analysed so as to address a series of fundamental questions. Three of these constitute traditional uses of the evidence available from an analysis of terra sigillata: which potters supplied the Theatre of Aptera and its environs; where these potters were active; when these potters were active and therefore what production centres supplied the Theatre of Aptera and its area over time. Two more questions go further, in an effort to take advantage of this kind of material?s ability to testify to patterns of contact and exchange, as well as to details of life within the Roman imperial system: what distribution patterns might have brought terra sigillata to the Theatre of Aptera and its vicinity; and whether we can suggest how terra sigillata was consumed in Aptera?s Theatre and its environs.

Aptera?s Theatre was a venue not only for performances but for drinking, eating, and serving, on the part of theatregoers, spectators, actors and other performers. These activities took place during a period of prosperity for Roman Aptera in the first and second centuries, a period that coincides nicely with the production and distribution of terra sigillata. The people of Aptera and the surrounding area took full advantage of Crete?s strategic position amid crossroads of transit and exchange as well as integration into the Roman economy, to display their prosperity and status in public and in private.

About the Author
Martha W. Baldwin Bowsky is a Professor Emerita of Classical Studies, retired from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California; she now lives and pursues research from a base in High Point, North Carolina. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She began her career as an epigraphist when she was involved in field research on Crete in 1979 and 1980, while preparing a doctoral dissertation on the Julio-Claudian governors of the province of Creta-Cyrenae. After a year at the University of California at Davis, she enjoyed a full career of teaching and research at University of the Pacific; she remains an active scholar and participant in international conferences. Throughout her career she has been active in epigraphical research on the archaeological sites and in the storerooms and museums of Crete, with a particular interest in the Roman period on the island. Her focus has turned from top-down studies of provincial administration to bottom-up studies of the material culture of the island as an active participant in the Roman empire. She has authored a significant number of articles both publishing new inscriptions – on stone and on pottery – and also setting these and other Cretan inscriptions into their historical and archaeological contexts.

Stamps on Terra Sigillata Found in Excavations of the Theatre of Aptera, Crete

by: Baldwin Bowsky, M.W.

• ISBN-13: 9781789692389 / 978-1-78969-238-9
• ISBN-03: 1789692385 / 1-78969-238-5
• Archaeopress, Oxford, 2019