Glass bowls with such ribbed decoration have been produced since the Hellenistic period, from the 1st century BC into the first few decades of the 1st century AD. This bowl would have been formed by blowing a bubble of glass into a mould, creating the ribs on the vessel’s external surface and leaving areas between the ribs extremely thin. This fine hemispherical bowl displays hues of green and blue, colours of Roman glass in its natural state, which resulted from the iron oxide present in the silica or the sand.
To find out more about Roman glass please see our relevant blog post: Collecting Roman Glass.
