Posts by Stefan Caliniuc:

Roman pottery in the countryside of Dobruja. Topolog as case study

This paper presents a pottery assemblage discovered at Topolog (Tulcea County) in 2010, at approximatively 500 m northwest of the village, in two refused pits severely affected by the extraction of clay by the locals. In the same area a rectangular kiln for the production of bricks and tiles was investigated. The pottery assemblage consists of transport amphorae for wine and salt fish (Shelov C and Zeest 84/85), fine ware (Pontic sigillata), drinking and cooking ware, and a number of hand-made pottery of La Tène tradition. These forms date back to the 2nd century AD and reflect the trade relations of a rural community from the periphery of the Empire with the north and south-eastern Pontic regions.

The population of Colonia Sarmizegetusa

This paper presents the population of Colonia Sarmizegetusa, the first city of the province of Dacia. This is a case study within the project Romans 1 by 1 (www.romans1by1.com), a database which aims to comprise the population of Dacia, Moesia Superior, and Moesia Inferior. This study presents a micro-result of the entire project, providing information to researchers not only on the people who lived in the Dacian metropolis but also on those individuals transiting through Colonia Sarmizegetusa, who got involved in the social, religious and political life of the city by erecting monuments or being dedicated to. Until this point, by compiling all existing sources, the database has recorded 495 inscriptions (the inscription records are numbered starting with 00001DS) and 706 people (each with a personal record, with a unique ID) from Colonia Sarmizegetusa. The paper’s conclusions present four results in the form of statistics, consisting of: (1) the analysis of the 495 epigraphic monuments; (2) identifying and implicitly analysing all the individuals attested on the inscriptions discovered at Colonia Sarmizegetusa; (3) population mobility, and (4) various types of relationships mentioned by epigraphic sources.

The Bioarchaeology of Humans in Italy: development and issues of a discipline

In Italy, the “Archaeology of Emergency” influences the work of physical anthropologists. In fact, most archaeological excavations are not completely investigated because of the lack of funds destined to cultural heritage and the archaeological competences intervene especially when building works bump accidentally into archaeological findings. Emergency excavations cannot pull any whole osteoarchaeological sample, thus the anthropological study is never exhaustive. In addition to this, in Italy there are still problems related to a lack of job perspective because there is not an adequate professional recognition of the bioarchaeologist. Perhaps the issues should be discussed at the root, namely that there is no clear university education that prepares for this type of profession. Today, only a postgraduate education (PhD or Master) can determine the acquisition of specific skills in the several specialties of Bioarcheology. In an era of cultural crisis, as ours is nowadays, it is a struggle to think of a right recognition of any professionalism employed in the field of cultural heritage, but we must insist for this to happen.

Salinae in Justinian’s Digest

This paper explores the references on the term salinae from Justinian’ Digest. Our approach is a semantic analysis of this term in various juridic contexts, such as: allowing permission by the state to constitute corporations for saltworks; the interdiction to alienate a saltpan from a pupillus; collecting the tax on salt-works; establishing the usufruct of inherited saltpans; the recognition of saltworks owners as publicani; the imposition of serving in saltworks as a punishment for a crime; exploring gender issues (the appliance of the same type of penalty to men and women convicted to saltworks labour); the obligation to acknowledge for the census the saltpans; the recognition of the tax on saltworks as a “public” one.

Investigating a Chalcolithic dwelling at Isaiia, Iași County, Romania

The detailed investigation of dwelling no. 14 (Precucuteni II phase) from the Isaiia site brings interesting and, in some instances, novel data concerning the building system and the internal architecture of the Early Chalcolithic housing. Also, the artefacts from inside the dwelling and from the surrounding features bear witness about prehistoric crafts like pottery manufacture, stone knapping and polishing, animal hard tissue working, about the relations with neighbouring cultural areas, and, last but not least, about the ritual behaviour of the Precucuteni communities.

From antiquities to memorabilia: a standardised terminology for ancestral artefacts according to manufacture date

An ancestral artefact can be defined as any object of natural raw material made by a people following a lifestyle based on foraging and/or basic agriculture or pastoralism. A problem when cataloguing or reporting a research focused on an ancestral artefact is the absence of a fixed chronological terminology encompassing any age. The issue of terminology of age of objects is especially relevant when a researcher wants to study museum collections. Consequently, putting into practice a standardised terminology for ancestral artefacts according to manufacture date is required to avoid misinterpretations, which can even jeopardise legal actions. In this paper, a standardised terminology is presented for such kinds of original artefacts, from prehistory to the present. Subsidiarily, ancestral peoples have been arranged in concordance with the terminology for ancestral artefacts. While this terminology is centred on ancestral artefacts and is primarily addressed to people engaged in museum specimens―from curators to researchers―it is applicable to other collectable objects and, accordingly, also relevant to tribal-art dealers, antiquarians, and cultural heritage legislators.

Diagenetic analysis and historical interpretations. Case studies from eastern Romania

Interdisciplinary investigations of the human osteological remains help us to understand the genetic diversity, the mobility or the paleodiet of the past communities and offer us insights on the diagenetic processes. The present study aims to assess the results of chemical, mineralogical and microscopic analyses performed on different human osteological remains selected from archaeological sites situated in Eastern Romania in order to understand the diagenetic transformations involved in the site formation processes and to estimate their influence on the historical interpretation.

The mysterious expedition of Thrasybulus of Miletus

A cursory mention of a mysterious expedition against Sicyon, mounted by Thrasybulus, the tyrant of Miletus, can be found in Frontinus’ “Strategemata”. The author of the present article is of the opinion that in this way Thrasybulus was helping his ally Periander, the tyrant of Corinth. The probable aim of Periander’s military campaign was to reinstate the exiled Isodemus as tyrant of Sicyon and to include the Sicyonians’ territory in Corinth’ sphere of influence.