Roman pigments and the trade in naturally sourced products

Summary

Pigments were used to decorate both wealthy and common houses in ancient Rome but the mechanisms by which raw pigments were collected, traded, and sold have never been studied. A network developed to facilitate the importation of pigments from across a wide expanse of the Roman empire. While the ochres present in a shop in Rome might be locally and regionally sourced, the presence of pigments like madder lake or cinnabar are the result of long chains of commercial transactions, which served to transport these materials to central Italy from across the empire. This extensive network provided consumers of pigments with the choice of a range of colors. Artists in Roman Egypt used Spanish red lead on certain "red shroud mummies" rather than local red pigments. Various white pigments were imported and used, and while the differences between each were not necessarily detectable with the naked eye, tradesmen kept careful track of them since their qualitative differences (e.g. luminosity) translated to differences in price. An exploration of the pigment trade establishes a cross-section of the larger Roman economy at work. Ultimately the colors chosen for a Roman fresco reflect the vital trade of the larger Roman empire on one’s walls.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage