Writing tablet

Half a wooden writing tablet, almost complete block. One corner damaged and split. Raised border on all four edges on one side for wax. One edge pieced by two small holes for binding, carved notch between them. Linear incisions both sides. Scratched marks.

The Romans used writing tablets to write letters, messages, notes and drafts of documents. Anything official that needed to last for a long time (records, contracts, legal documents), would be written in ink on thin pieces of wood or on parchment scrolls made from animal skin.

The tablets contained a layer of beeswax, which could be inscribed with a pointed ‘stylus’ (pen). Tablets could either be bound together with leather or fastened with metal binders. Once the inscription was no longer needed the wax was heated, smoothed and re-used.