An archaeological find such as the Boscoreale. Treasure, probably buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in 69 AD and now in the Louvre, is ample proof of the high quality of Roman silverware. The luxurious items were for the domestic use of people with the means to purchase heavy tableware in such prestigious material. The carafes, vases and salt cellars were hidden in haste. They are decorated in relief, and one cup, now destroyed, bore a scene of homage to Augustus. A similar hoard, unearthed at Hildesheim and now in Berlin, tends to indicate the absence of silversmiths’ workshops in these regions. The sixty or so pieces may well have been looted from a number of smaller collections in Italy. The delicate ornamental motifs of griffins, putti and foliage which completely cover the surface of the bowls and other vessels are proof of a very close relationship with the monumental art of the Augustan period, in particular the paintings and stuccowork of the Villa Farnesina. This type of silverware was also an important influence on ceramicists, who appear to have imitated it, particularly at Arezzo. The repoussé technique in vogue until the mid-first century AD, gradually gave way to casting. Gallo-Roman workshops, for instance, used the latter technique almost exclusively. Then, during the late third century, repoussé decoration seems to have made a comeback and became the standard technique in the late Empire. To this period belong silver caskets with pagan and Christian motifs, boxes and reliquaries, ewers or oinochoes (wine—jugs) and flasks. Plates continued to be east, and were sometimes decorated using the niello engraving technique. Among the characteristic artefacts of this period are the silver ewer owned by the Cleveland Museum of Art and the Louvre oinochoe, which is decorated with hunting scenes, animals and leaf patterns. The motifs arc akin to those found in fourth- century mosaics. The links between the different media are worth emphasizing in this context.

As well as silver, pottery was widely used for household purposes. We have already seen how terracotta was sometimes used as a substitute material for small—format sculptures, architectural features, busts and portraits. But, in Roman times, it was ceramics that accounted for mass production in this field. Everyday pottery was made in various styles: with a black or brown glaze, particularly for drinking vessels; with a golden glint to it, reminiscent of a metal finish; with the inner surfaces in red or brown; with a polished, slip finish; or in a more basic style, with neither slip nor colour, for cooking purposes. Roman pottery was produced from moulds, with relief decoration reflecting the period, region, technique and workshop.

The term bronze covets a number of copper-based alloys. In Roman times, the word aes was used for both copper and bronze, which is explained by the fact that adding another metal to copper improves its properties without changing its nature. For technical and economic reasons, there was a tendency to add more or less lead, which somewhat reduced the strength of the resulting alloy. The practice was nonetheless common, as it allowed the metal to be cast at lower temperatures, and made it flow more freely. Roman bronzes were therefore alloys of copper, tin, lead and sometimes zinc.

According to Polybius, who is quoted by Strabo, copper, lead and silver mines were intensively exploited by a large labour force. In the Republican era, mines were leased by the State. The Spanish mines supplied ingots to the whole Roman world. Bronze was used for many purposes: tableware, luxury household items, machinery, tablets of laws, architectural decoration, portraits of important people and statues to the gods. However, many bronze artefacts have not survived, partly owing to corrosion, but more often because they were melted down and recast at a later date. The value of the material and the unlimited scope for recycling it explains why so many works have disappeared. Some, of course, were transformed into bronze coins. In Classical times, bronze portraits and statues were in fact just as common as those made of stone or marble.

The recent discovery, near Cape Miseno, of an equestrian statue of Domitian, subsequently transformed into a portrait of Nerva, may be linked to the report of Dio Cassius, who states that, so the late second century AD, Didius lulianus refused the golden statue the Senate had decided to erect so his honour in these terms: “Give me a statue of bronze, which will last. I see that all the gold and silver statues in honour of my predecessors have been destroyed, while those made of bronze are still standing.” But Dio adds: “He was wrong, because the bronze statue that was dedicated to him, as he had desired, was, in its turn, destroyed after his fall.”

Examination of imperial statues shows that, after casting, bronze was often gilded, which increased its prestige. Recent restoration work has revealed traces of the layer of gold applied to the equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, formerly on the Capitoline. Of the prestigious statues executed in bronze, we might mention the Capitolinc She- Wolf, the Head, of Brutus in the Palazzo dei Conservatori, the statue in the Museo delle Terme often believed to represent a Hellenistic sovereign (though in fact a likeness of Titus Quinctius Flaminius), the “Orator” in the Archaeological Museum in Florence, and a large number of imperial portraits. Whole groups of statues were sometimes executed in bronze, for instance the group of male and female figures and horses found at Cartoecto, now in the Ancona Museum. Given the large number of surviving imperial portraits from the provinces, workshops must have operated in quite far-flung places, a supposition confirmed by examination of the portrait of Hadrian recently acquired by the Louvre.

Though denying, directly or indirectly, from large-scale official sculpture, bronze statuettes were more or less mass produced in many regions. Study of those produced in an important legionary centre such as Carnuntum sheds light on the tastes and beliefs of the soldiery, trade in the region, workshops and imports. The groop of statuettes found in 1830 at Montorio, near Verona, is suggestive of a small household shrine in which Jupiter was the chief deity, surrounded by many other figures. The small bronze statuette from the Colomb Collection at Sistéron reveals that there was a trade in small—format replicas intended purely for the pleasure of the purchaser, in this case a fine new reproduction of the Farnese Antinous.

From Late Antiquity, fewer bronze statues, busts and portraits have survived. Instead, the material was used for utilitarian objects of various kinds: harnesses, tableware, weapons, knives and buckles. lo the religious field, bronze was used for many fine liturgical items; examples of these arc suspended and processional crosses, censers, vases and communion plates.