Mortarium

This Roman mixing bowl is called a mortarium and was made in modern-day St Albans or Brockley Hill - the rim is stamped with the potter's name in Latin 'ALBINVS'. This man, Albinus, was a highly skilled potter, who produced huge quantities of mortaria- 420 with his stamp have been found in Britain. Mortaria were made with a gritty clay, because they were used like a pestle-and-mortar, to grind up foodstuffs. Scientific analyses of mortaria in Britain discovered that they were used to grind dairy products, fats and plants. We don't know what was ground-up in this one, but it was used so much that a hole was worn in the bottom!