A Silver Dish from the Tyne

Abstract

In the Journal of Roman Studies for last year Professor Haverfield gives an account of certain silver vessels of the late Roman age found on the banks of the Tyne, near Corbridge, in the eighteenth century. I wish to discuss in some detail one of these vessels, which has great importance for the history of late Greek art. This is the remarkable dish or lanx found in 1735 on the north bank of the Tyne, now belonging to the Duke of Northumberland, and kept at his castle of Alnwick.Other vessels of silver were found, not with it, but near the same spot: a two-handled cup, a bowl bearing the Christ monogram, a silver basin, a small silver vase. Professor Haverfield has figured these, so far as he could. That all these vases belonged together is probable though not certain. Only one of them bears a clear indication of date, the Christian monogram, in the form which it takes on coins of the Constantine period. This particular vessel one would naturally give to the time of Constantine, that is, to the earlier part of the fourth century. It does not follow that all the vessels are of this date: but as we shall see presently, it is a date not unsuitable for the dish which we are considering.