Baubles, bangles and beads : recycling coloured glasses in the British Iron Age and Roman periods

Compositional analysis has proved to be a powerful tool for investigating the recycling of transparent glass in the Roman and Byzantine periods. This paper expands the focus further to explore the recycling of coloured and opaque glass in the Late Iron Age and Roman periods in Britain. A review of the findings to date, predominantly for beads and bangles, illustrates how a combination of methods is needed to identify when coloured glass has been recycled and altered in the past. Chemical analysis, microstructural examination and experimentation have been used to understand how coloured glass was mixed, diluted, and modified with novel colourants and opacifiers, in ways that are not apparent from non-destructive chemical analysis alone. The paper discusses the possible types and sources of trade glass, the challenges of recycling mono- and polychrome glass in different colours, and the unconventional methods used by glassworkers on the periphery of Roman influence to extend and modify coloured glass to produce distinctive items in order to express their identity.