Down the drain is where British archaeologists recently discovered 36 artfully engraved semiprecious stones, in an ancient bathhouse at the site of a Roman fort near Hadrian’s Wall in Carlisle, England. The colorful intaglios — gems with incised carvings — likely fell out of signet rings worn by wealthy third-century bathers, and ended up trapped in the stone drains.
The stones vary in size from 5mm to 16mm, or the size of a pencil eraser to the size of a dime. The deposit seems to date to the 2nd century AD. The gems presumably fell out of their settings when the glue was loosened by the steamy environment of the baths. People wore their rings into the bath because theft was such a problem, which we know from the number of curse tablets directed at thieves who stole jewelry from bath houses. Other objects found in the drain included 100 hairpins, which makes the excavators suspect that this stuff belonged to women.
On the other hand baubles like these did not protect people from intestinal parasites, vitamin deficiencies, overwork, breathing smoky air, accidents, or any of the other ills that gave them such short lives.
Ungated summary here.
1 comment:
Other objects found in the drain included 100 hairpins, which makes the excavators suspect that this stuff belonged to women.
This is such an immensely myopic assumption to make.
These are dated to the 2nd century, and they're from the far north of modern day England, right near Hadrian's Wall and the border with Scotland.
This find is located smack dab in a major confluence region for all three of the Pictish, Brittonic, and Goidelic culture groupings. Carlisle predates the Romans, and even when they were there, the locals were the vast majority of the population.
Who are these dunderheads analyzing this find that think the presence hair pins must indicate women, as if men in this time and place didn't frequently wear their hair extremely long? The Celts were famous for wearing their hair long - the Romans themselves referred to them as "Long Haired Gauls", for crying out loud! It was a known status symbol among the Celtic warrior class!
Talk about letting yourself be blinded by modern day sensibilities!
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