Black-Gloss Ceramics from the Samnite/Roman Forum Complex on Monte Pallano

The purpose of this study is to make a preliminary classification of the black-gloss fabrics and forms from the 1999 excavation season at the Samnite/Roman settlement on Monte Pallano, a regional pagus center with a forum complex and a Hellenistic sanctuary, located within the middle Sangro River Valley. This study aims to offer a starting point to understand the production and consumption of black-gloss pottery on the site of the forum complex and to begin to identify the relationship between ceramic material culture, economic systems and identity construction from the Roman Republican/Early Imperial (ca. 50 B.C.E.-50 C.E.) public structures on Monte Pallano. The research in this dissertation represents the first systematic investigation of the black gloss pottery, a fine-ware ceramic that was circulated widely in the Mediterranean in the fourth-first centuries B.C.E. This dissertation, therefore, aids in laying the foundation for understanding how the people of the central- eastern coast of Italy produced, traded, and consumed fine wares. The research objective addresses the dearth of information on eastern black-gloss production as well as the need to study Monte Pallano's economy and identity through the black-gloss pottery. This project, in addition to establishing a traditional, though preliminary classification of the Monte Pallano black gloss, presents the preliminary chemical characterization of the black-gloss fabrics from the site using portable x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (pXRF). Finally, by developing the typology and chemical characterization of the black-gloss pottery, the project ultimately advances the knowledge of Monte Pallano's role as a pagus center during the first centuries B.C.E and C.E. when trade was increasing across the Mediterranean due to the expansion of Roman hegemony.