Les textiles archéologiques romains découverts en contexte nautique et portuaire : les cas de Rezé/Ratiatum (Loire-Atlantique) et de Lyon/Lugdunum (Rhône)
The planned excavations carried out between 2013 and 2016 in the port and commercial district of Saint-Lupien in Rezé (Loire-Atlantique) have brought to light a set of textile remains with specific technical characteristics. They were discovered in burial conditions that allowed the textiles to reta...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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CNRS Éditions
2021-04-01
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| Series: | Gallia |
| Online Access: | http://journals.openedition.org/gallia/5513 |
| Summary: | The planned excavations carried out between 2013 and 2016 in the port and commercial district of Saint-Lupien in Rezé (Loire-Atlantique) have brought to light a set of textile remains with specific technical characteristics. They were discovered in burial conditions that allowed the textiles to retain information enabling them to be restored to their last state of use. The parallel with other archaeological discoveries made in a similar environment offers an essential contribution to the knowledge of the artisanal environment of Roman ports. The Rezean collection of poisoned fabrics has thus made it possible to highlight the presence of unctores (caulkers) or, at the very least, sailors or workers mastering the caulking technique. Put into perspective with other collections of poissed textiles, such as those used for waterproofing boats, Rezean fabrics have provided new data. The corpus of comparison includes textiles discovered in two types of specific contexts. A first group includes the discoveries made on the site of the Bourse in Marseille (Bouches-du-Rhône), the Petit-Creusot in Chalon-sur-Saône (Saône-et-Loire) and the Rhône in Arles (Bouches-du-Rhône). A second group comes from the textiles used for the waterproofing of Gallo-Roman shipping, with wrecks from the Rhône in Lyon-Saint-Georges (Rhône) and Arles (Bouches-du-Rhône). All these textiles have the same specificity, that of being reused. Putting them into perspective has made it possible to restore them to their original state of use and to demonstrate their careful manufacture. The recycling of these fabrics in a port context provides an unprecedented contribution to the production and use of textiles in the 1st c. AD and, more generally, in the High Empire. They reveal the gestures of craftsmen, jobs specific to a corporation and, more generally, allow us to better assess the place of textiles in the naval world of the Roman period. |
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| ISSN: | 0016-4119 2109-9588 |