[Bonetools] Roman bone pin work waste

[Ian Riddler]

Hello Lena,

I would also endorse Sabine's Augst volume, which is one of the most 
essential texts for anything to do with Roman bone working. Also extremely 
good is Isabelle Bertrand's edited volume Le travail de l'os, du bois de 
cerf et de la corne... Monographies Instrumentum 34. That volume usefully 
summarises some of the terrific work that French archaeologists like 
Isabelle and Annick Thuet and others have been doing over the last decade. 
Stephen Greep published the Canterbury late Roman bone pin workshop 
summarily in the CAT Marlowe Theatre volumes and Jackie Keily has published 
some of the Roman London assemblages very well, but I would argue that 
England is a long way behind in coming to terms with Roman bone and antler 
working. Great scope for a new phd student to take these assemblages on.

The choice of raw material mirrors the Middle Saxon assemblages that I have 
been working on for a few decades now - see the enclosed text for an example 
of how I dealt with what might be a similar assemblage, but several 
centuries later in date.  Assuming that the proximal and distal ends survive 
reasonably well there is great scope for looking at the deliberate selection 
of bone for working, the specific choices made by species and bone type and 
the chaine operatoire involved. Lots to consider, some of which I have 
outlined.

Hope this helps,

Ian Riddler

-----Original Message----- 
From: Lena Strid
Sent: Friday, May 09, 2014 12:44 PM
To: Mailing list for archaeologists of the research group for the study of 
object and waste of bone, antler. ivory and horn.
Subject: [Bonetools] Roman bone pin work waste

Dear all,

I have a very large Roman deposit of chopped up long bones from making bone 
pins. The bones are mostly cattle and horse metapodials, radius and tibia. 
The deposit is sampled entirely, sieved down to 4mm, and contains everything 
from large proximal and distal ends down to broken-off hexagonal offcuts. It 
is a rural site, but very close to a Roman town in southern England.

Would any of you have any tips on the most useful way to record the deposit 
and/or a good reference material. I already know of Vine St (Leicester) and 
Sagalassos (Turkey). There is unlikely to be time for me to do a in-depth 
analysis of the bone working procedure, but the assemblage would be retained 
for future research.

With thanks,
Lena
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