Byzantine glass

Byzantine glass objects highly resembled their earlier Roman counterparts during the fourth and early fifth centuries CE in both form and function. Over the course of the fifth century CE, Byzantine glass blowers, based mostly in the area of Syria and Palestine, developed a distinct Byzantine style. While glass vessels continued to serve as the primary vehicles for pouring and drinking liquid, glassware for lighting, currency and commodity weights, window panes, and glass tesserae for mosaics and enamels also surged in popularity. Following the Arab conquests of the seventh century CE, large quantities of glass were imported from the Levant, which continued to produce raw and manufactured glass. Scholars once believed that glassware was an expensive luxury good reserved for the upper strata of society, however, recent archaeological excavations have unearthed a considerable quantity of unadorned glassware intended for lower-class residents.

Chemical analyses of Byzantine glassware have demonstrated that Byzantine glass was composed of the same basic materials as Roman glass — combining sand-derived silica, a fluxing agent, and lime, as well as various coloring agents.

Roman and Byzantine glass-making was divided into two phases. The first, called “primary glass-making” involved the conversion of sand and stabilizer into raw glass. Separate workshops would then re-heat the glass and shape it into an object, in a phase referred to as “secondary glass-making.” Although there is considerable archaeological evidence establishing primary glass-making sites, secondary glass-making sites remain difficult to pinpoint.

The largest number of glass production sites from the Early Byzantine period have been unearthed in Syria and Palestine, as well as Egypt. Glass factories have also been discovered in Greece (Corinth, Thessoloniki) and Asia Minor. A chemical analysis of sixth-century Byzantine glass weights demonstrated that glass was also manufactured in Carthage and along the Danube River. Literary sources refer to glass-making sites in Constantinople, Emesa (Homs, Syria), and various Egyptian towns.

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