- Weights, Gold Vessels, Silver Vessels, Bronze Vessels, Lead Vessels, Pewter
Vessels, Shale Vessels, Glass Vessels, Spoons - Brooches, Rings, Gems, Bracelets, Helmets, Shields, Weapons, Iron Tools,
Baldric Fittings, Votives in Gold, Silver and Bronze, Lead Pipes, Roundels,
Sheets and Other Lead Objects, Stone Roundels, Pottery and Bone
Roundels, Other Objects of Bone - Wooden Barrels, Stilus Tablets, Objects of Wood, Leather, Oculists’
Stamps, Wallplaster, Mosaics, Handmills, Stone Tablets, Stone Balls, Stone
Pebbles, Small Stone Votives, Miscellaneous Objects of Stone, Jet, Clay
Figurines, Clay Objects, Antefixes, Tile Stamps of Legion II Augusta, of
Legion VI Victrix, of Legion IX Hispana, of Legion XX Valeria Victrix,
Tile Stamps of the Auxiliaries - Tile Stamps of the Classis Britannica; Imperial, Procuratorial and Civic Tile
Stamps; Stamps of Private Tilers, Inscriptions on Relief Patterned Tiles
and Graffiti on Tiles - Dipinti and Graffiti on Amphorae, Dipinti and Graffiti on Mortaria,
Inscriptions in White Barbotine, Dipinti on Coarse Pottery, Samian
Barbotine or Moulded - Graffiti on Samian Ware/Terra Sigillata
- Graffiti on Coarse Pottery Cut before and after Firing, Stamps on Coarse
Pottery
The gaps are obvious, but what we do have is rather interesting. These
texts can be broadly classified as follows. The smallest group are those that
emanate from the actions of the state. The militarydiplomataare the main
examples here, along with some of the lapidary epigraphy from the two
walls, on milestones and the like. These are highly formulaic, made use
of standard abbreviations, and include most of our longest documents.
Thediplomataare a rare trace from this end of the empire of those
personal archives of official documents, which are more fully represented
from Egypt and other arid environments where papyri and parchment
have survived.
A second group, also quite small in number, are texts or numbers
integral to the manufactured objects. The numbers and signs on gaming
tokens are a case in point, and some (although not all) of the writing on
coins could be included. These objects provide evidence for habits of
thought and practice we mostly associate with the complex world of
urban communities, but one that was equally present in the quasi-urban
environments of the camps.^32 They were the tools and toys of people
quite used to using numbers and letters, weights and measures in their
everyday life, people who picked up a new format of text as easily as the
computer literate today pick up a new application.
A third group, much more numerous, are those marks generated in the
making, transportation, and perhaps retailing of objects. Stamps on tiles
- Purcell 1995 on the cognitive and cultural implications of Roman gambling.
Literacy or Literacies in Rome? 55