The really special dish which the Trust recently excavated in a Roman cremation burial at Colchester (see previous blog post) is special because of its contents – and these are a small group of bones from a young pig. The bones represent a funerary offering of cooked meat on the bone, which were placed in the grave in the dish. This is a first from Roman Colchester and we are very excited about it. The bones represent a knee joint and rack of ribs plus an unidentifiable bone, and the two knee bones are very unusual. (The ‘knee’ is an actual pork knee, from a hind leg, not the cut of meat called ‘pork knee’ or ham hock or pork knuckle.) Trust archaeologist Dr Pip Parmenter, who specialises in faunal archaeology (the study of animal bone), says that the dish with the meat offering is ‘very special’!
Trust excavator Nigel Rayner excavated the dish: he exposed the top of the knee joint but, in accordance with Trust practice, he lifted the dish with the contents unexcavated. Some of the finds from the burial were processed by Trust archaeology volunteers in October and, in November, Pip partially excavated the contents of the dish here at the Roman circus centre. However, the more closely we looked at the contents of this dish, the more and more remarkable it was revealed to be. We have decided to preserve the bones in position in the dish and so we have not fully excavated or removed them. Pip was able to identify the bones without removing them. Trust archaeologist Steve Benfield has been repeatedly treating the dish and the bones with a weak PVA solution to stabilise them and fix them in position, but he seems to have finished this week…
The Trust has excavated animal bones from Roman cemeteries at Colchester before, such as at the Butt Road site, and these are interpreted as the remains of funerary feasts or offerings. Most of the vessels which we excavate in Roman burials were buried upright, suggesting that they originally contained food or drink but, usually, no evidence of the foodstuffs is apparent. In 1972, we did excavate some chicken bones from a Roman burial on the site of St John’s church in Colchester. However, this special cooked pork was prepared and deliberately deposited on a dish in the burial, for the deceased on their journey to or ‘life’ in the Underworld. The dish is a medium-sized grey ware vessel and it is almost complete. Curiously, the ribs had been butchered with a sharp implement, while the two long bones of the knee joint had been broken by a blunt implement. The ribs seem, remarkably, to be lying in the position in which they were placed in the dish, when they were held together by tissue. The long bones are unfused and indicate a young pig. The bones look as though the meat had been carefully arranged in the serving-dish to be deposited in the burial. The soil from the bowl will be analysed for our report. Nigel says that it was very interesting to excavate such an unusual find, an offering of meat on the bone, in a burial.
In Eating and drinking in Roman Britain (by H E M Cool, 2006), the author refers to three Roman burials which included offerings of meat on some kind of base. A pyre burial for an adult high-status male from the cemetery outside the fort at Brougham included a dish of unburnt shoulder of pork. A Roman cremation burial at Winchester included a shale tray with the bones of two joints of pork, each with an iron knife, placed on it, plus a large dish and cup of samian ware, and a spoon, with further pottery vessels in the grave. In another Roman cremation burial at Winchester, the remains of a young pig were recovered on a shale tray with an iron knife and spoon. A Roman burial at Stansted in Essex included a joint of pork with a knife, placed in the base of a chest. A cremation burial at Canterbury castle included a samian dish on which lay the remains of a small bird (http://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue17/1/app9.1.html ). It is, apparently, very rare to find a Roman burial in Britain which includes an offering of meat on a base, especially a pottery dish. The pork here may have been left over from the funerary feast and then placed in the burial as an offering. Pork is usually interpreted as being a high-status Roman food and associated with urban or military centres in Roman Britain, but the knee would have been a low-status cut, providing little meat.
The medium-sized dish of cooked meat had been placed in the grave as part of a group of pottery vessels, ie a small dish, a beaker, and a cooking-pot, as well as the cremation urn. The small bowl and the beaker would represent an individual table setting. When deposited, all the vessels – except for the cremation urn – probably contained food and drink, for the deceased on their journey to or for their ‘life’ in the Underworld. All the grave goods may have been deposited in a large nailed wooden box in the grave. Although the pottery vessels are full size, we think that the deceased represented by this burial may have been a child, possibly a young girl, whose cremated remains were buried with a good set of burial goods, including the really special dish of cooked meat…
The Trust will publish a full report on the funerary offering of meat in our site report.
The Flagstaff House complex is within the old Colchester garrison and originally included the garrison’s commanding officers’ quarters, later the garrison HQ. The site where the complex stands includes part of the site of the Roman circus and at least one Roman burial area. The surviving buildings have been converted for residential use and new dwellings are being built around them.
The Trust’s archaeological fieldwork projects at the Flagstaff House complex – now called ‘Arena Place’ – are being funded by Taylor Wimpey. The fieldwork is being undertaken by various members of the Trust’s excavation team and the burial was excavated by Nigel Rayner and Alec Wade.
The images show the dish being excavated out by Pip in November and the remains of the remarkable offering of cooked meat in the dish.
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(Coincidentally, yesterday (15th December), we retweeted a Tweet about an ancient dish of meat stew or soup which has been excavated in China! – see www.archaeology.org/news/5142-161215-china-beef-stew and images at www.ecns.cn/visual/hd/2016/12-15/113436.shtml .)
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