OLCESE G. - G. FINKIELSZTEJN (2012) Similar production and control of amphoras in Ischia/Naples and the South East Aegean in the late IVth-early IIIrd c. BC

The aim of stamping amphoras in the in Late Classical-Hellenistic period Greek World generated hypotheses and harsh debates till today. All agree that the stamping is evidence for a “public” control by the city of production. However, two main theories opose scholars: 1) the control was internal, limited to the stamped containers, their production for a probable taxation (mainly Y. Garlan); 2) the control of amphoras was part of that exercised on instuments linked to production and trade, and it provided a civic guarantee also to buyers; as for minted coins, inscribed weights and measures or stamped roof tiles and bricks, the stamping of amphoras guaranteed the origin, quality and quantity of both the containers and the content; indeed, at some point, all these instruments shared the same civic symbols; the form of the vessel also contributed to the guaranteeby a city or a (commercial) koine of cities, (mainly G. Finkielsztejn). Scholars neclected the stamping in Greek of the instrumentum found in Italy, particularly the amphoras of the Hellenistic period, due to the scarcity of finds and an attention concentrated primarily on the stamping in Latin. The study by Gloria Olcese of the numerous stamps in Greek on ancient"Graeco-Italic" amphoras (probably for wine) discovered at Ischia/Lacco Ameno, in pottery worshops active from the VIIIth till the IIIrd/IInd c. B.C., is of utmost interest. Laboratory chemical and mineralogical tests allowed identifying amphora productions in Ischia and in the Gulf of Naples, from the second half of the IVth to the beginning of the IIIrd c. B. C. The stamps bear Greek and Oscan names, written in Greek. The same stamps may appear on tiles, sometimes preceded by the abbreviation DH( (demosion?). Letters and monograms on the stamps of Ischia may correspond to some appearing on coins of Neapolis of the IVth/IIIrd c. B.C. They may either name the same magistrates, or members of families that would produce the latter. These marks seem evidence of a civic control (with guarantee) of the production and/or taxation of the containers, their content (quality wine) and their quantity based on a given standard of measure. Ischia and Naples appear to have shared administrative principles, fiscal and commercial, with cities of Central and Eastern Greece in the Hellenistic Period. One should try and understand when the stamping started in Naples and its precise aim. It may be suggested, preliminarily, that the practice may have been initiated by the arrival of the Romans in the area (326 B.C.). The concomitant begining of production of amphoras bearing both "mushroom-rims" and a "systematic" stamping in Ischia/Naples and the Southeastern Mediterranean seems evidence for strong contacts between distant cities, "metropolises" or "colonies", already existing for four centuries in I. Malkin's "Small Greek World". The detailed mechanisms – "influences", "koina" or mere common choices of the poleis – remain to be understood, in each cases.