Acetabulum (vessel)

Roman acetabulum made of violet opaque glass with colored ornaments, melted in the form; made between the 1st century BC and AD, from Millefiori ; Museum August Kestner in Hanover

Acetabulum ("Essignäpfchen", from Latin acetum , vinegar, Greek ὀξύβαφον) was a small Roman table vessel for storing vinegar and honey .

Form and use

Acetabula could be made of metal, glass, or ceramic. Of Ulpian they are among the silver mentioned vessels. They usually had a narrow rim with a wide opening and widened like a chalice ("constricted wall"). Acetabula from Terra Sigillata exist in the 1st century AD in the vessel shapes Dragendorff 24, 25 and 27. They are dragged by the conical bowl in the 2nd century. 33 replaced. Larger specimens of the same vessel shape were called paropsis .

At the table, they were used to store vinegar, which was used by the diners to season food and drinks ( posca ) or to clean it like a finger bowl today , as well as honey. They were also used in a similar way in the kitchen for cooking. Acetabula could also be used for other things, such as melting wax. At Apicius , the vessel is also called a cooking vessel. The bowls were relatively small in size.

A vessel could also generally be referred to as an acetabulum . Seneca calls the turntables cup acetabulum . Furthermore, an ancient volume measure was so named (see acetabulum (volume measure) ), this had a capacity of approx. 0.068 liters. Various hollows in living beings were named after the characteristic shape, such as the acetabulum . This already happened in Roman times, for the first time in the natural history of the older Pliny .

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  A second acetabulum in Hanover

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  Terra-Sigillata- Acetabulum (form Dragendorff 27 , front right) and single-handle jug ( Niederbieber 27 ) made of Novaesium .

literature

• Friedrich Hultsch : Acetabulum . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume I, 1, Stuttgart 1893, column 155 f.
• Werner Hilgers : Latin vessel names. Names, function and shape of Roman vessels based on ancient written sources. Rheinland-Verlag, Düsseldorf 1969, No. 1.
• Rolf Hurschmann : Acetabulum. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 1, Metzler, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-476-01471-1 , Sp. 56-56.

Web links

Commons : Roman Acetabula  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ulpian: Digest 34, 2, 19, 9.
2. ^ Friedrich Drexel : Roman sigillata services. In: Germania 11, 1928, pp. 51-53, here: p. 52; Dietwulf Baatz : Fort Hesselbach and other research on the Odenwald Limes. Gebr. Mann, Berlin 1973, ISBN 3-7861-1059-X ( Limes Research 12 ), pp. 87f.
3. ↑ August Oxé : The pottery bills of the Graufesenque. In: Bonner Jahrbücher 130, 1925, pp. 85f .; Werner Hilgers : Latin vessel names. Names, function and shape of Roman vessels based on ancient written sources. Rheinland-Verlag, Düsseldorf 1969, p. 33f.
4. ↑ Isidore of Seville : Etymologiae 20, 4, 12.
5. ↑ Apicius 6, 8, 3; also: Apici excerpta a Vindario VI.
6. ↑ Quintilian : Institutio oratoria 8, 6, 35.
7. ↑ Seneca: Epistulae morales 45, 7.
8. ↑ Pliny: Naturalis historia 9, 85; 91; 18, 245; 21, 92; 26, 58; 28, 179.