Roman teapot with ribs

The Roman glass vessel (bowl), decorated with ribs on a transparent glass body, was a part of the furnishings of an inhumation grave, covered with stone paving. The grave also contained a second, almost identical, slightly smaller glass vessel, which has also survived to the present day and is held in the collection of the National Museum in Szczecin. The burial was discovered by accident in April 1883. Various information can be found on its furnishings. In the grave, apart from the two glass vessels, there was certainly a Roman bronze saucepan, according to some authors with the inscription CIPIPOLIB, a fragment of another bronze vessel, and possibly a wooden bucket with metal fittings. The twin bowls from Kosin represent a form of glass vessels that were commonly used both in the ancient world and in areas of Barbaricum. They were produced in glass workshops located in the eastern part of the Mediterranean basin. An analogous vessel was found in one of the "princely graves” in the cemetery in Lubieszewo, Gryfice poviat, which, just like the grave in Kosin, is an example of the striking burials of tribal elites that emerged in the societies of Western Pomerania in the first century AD. The inflow of imported Roman bronze and glass vessels was one of the main impulses causing social stratification. Both bowls from Kosin are dated to the Roman period (2nd half of the 1st century). However, the cultural identification of the grave from Kosin is still obscure. The funerary rites generally correspond to the tradition of the Wielbark culture. Some researchers, however, distinguish the so-called “Przyrzyce cluster” (group) with features of the Wielbark culture and traces of the influence of cultures occupying the Lower Elbe region.

Bartłomiej Rogalski