Excellent stuff. Guy De La Bedoyere is one of those historians whose enthusiasm really rubs off. I must hunt this Shire Archaeology edition down..!

This video is so insightful. Thank you for sharing your work with us, Guy!

I love the fact that archaeologists found "brand new" Roman Samian Ware still in shipping containers in Pompeii.

Guy was one of my favorites on Time Team.

Thanks for these self-produced videos. I don't need fancy production values or silly dramatics, I'm here for the content. That said, I still love and miss Time Team.

We’ve been watching a lot of Time Team in the evenings during this pandemic. It is good to see you again, Guy, and to get your musings on your areas of expertise. As you looked back at your TT experience and more recently you teaching career, it was gratifying to see your main priority change to your grandchildren’s lives. I’ve had a similar experience and came to the same conclusion. First things first!

Samian was the equivalent to desirable tech today, something to be exited about, affordable but slightly pricey, worth saving up for. The glazing process was a wonderful example of quality control, still coming out of the ground beautifully smooth & glossy. The supply chain process: another good example of product promotion & distribution. The overall historical period of it's success as a brand is also a salutary lesson to any company today, even taking into account the slower speed of life in Roman times, it made people happy, exited, & in its own way helped to spread the concepts of mutual commercialisation we take for granted today.

Hi Guy, We have made a replica of a Greek kiln in which we fired replica rural pots made between the 5th and 3rd century BC, found in Metaponto in Naples. We produced black gloss that was not thick enough but could achieved a decent result with some vases. I watched your video expecting some comments on how the slip for Samian ware was produced but no mention of it was made. Could you please explain about this point? Is it shown in your book? Thanks

Thank you so much for your intelligent and accessible videos. So much is dumbed down on KZfaq.

Interesting this. I have been reading your book Roman Britain A New History, and recently read the part where you mention that it is one of the enigmas, why pottery so quickly ceased to be made. Is it the case that within a few decades there is hardly any pottery being made or used in Britain?

Samian always makes me want to eat chocolate!! Someone should make Samian inspired chocolate Easter eggs!!

They still do this in china with porcelain ware...some chinese bloke will run around villages to repair broken porcelain with metal rivet because porcelaine are expensive for normal people.

I find it ironic that Samian sounds a lot like Zemjan pronounced Zemyan which means earth ware in macedonian! Could it be possible that the word came from the Macedonians? Like the word greek which comes from the Roman Latin word Grecians, and Grecians comes from the Macedonian word Grejci pronounced Greitsi meaning foreigners! There's a lot of pottery that is claimed to be ancient Greek but we know that the Greeks were still a minority group that King Philip II of Macedonia went and conquered! And we know that the Macedonians fell to the Romans when they rose to power, first invading the Etruscans and occupying them, then they ransacked Carthage and demolished it to the ground, next on the list was the Macedonians and this behaviour carried on everywhere they went! The Romans are credited as great builders but all I see is the destruction they caused! They ended the Egyptian monarchy! The Macedonians were using Clay long before the Romans appeared! Not just pottery, terracotta roof tiles and the standard flat terracotta brick! Wherever you find an archway built using this terracotta flat brick and also as a feature in wall's as a boarder, this is Macedonian and far older than the Roman period! The only time that Macedonians are mentioned in historical accounts is often confused with greek history which is a totally different history! There are lots of hints that people miss like why did only the Greeks get the title of Greco Romans when they completed their slavery contract and were able to purchase their freedom to become a Roman citizen? Did the Romans only take Greeks as slaves? I certainly doubt it, if the Romans were talking slaves from one area, then they would have been taking them from everywhere else, after all they did need people since Hannibal of Carthage was getting rid of the Roman population.... So either I don't know about others or the Greeks were the only ones? And if they were the only ones, why? Could it be possible that they were different compared to everyone else? They did arrive in Europe after the Santorini island volcano erupted, had they arrived before this cataclysm, they would have to have moved away from the epicenter and we would have a largely greek speaking Europe today, but the reality is that Europe is largely a Slavic speaking population which can only be traced back to the Macedonians who had to abandon their ancient capital city of Hella and relocate further east to the new city of Pella! The book of exodus from the bible tells us the story of how the Greeks or as they are called in the bible as Israelites, Moses was told by God to head for the pillar of smoke by day and pillar of fire by night, this pillar reference is the erupting Santorini volcano, so while the Israelites (Greeks/foreigners) are making progress towards the present day Greece, the Macedonians had already evacuated that location giving the opportunity for foreigners to turn up and occupy! And lo and behold there's an archeological layer that shows that the Israelites were there on the island of Crete! Below that layer is a thick ash layer from Santorini and below that is one of the many Macedonian kingdoms that surrounded the Macedonian capital. There's no chance that the Greeks actually achieved anything! Occupied by the Macedonians, then the Romans, then the Ottoman Empire! It's only after the fall of the Ottoman Turks with the helping hand of the British that the Greeks finally got their own identity, autonomy and recognition but for all the wrong reasons! All the ancient Macedonian ruins in Greece today are still nothing more than tourist attractions! And that's exactly what we see in every single other location around the world where something ancient was discovered but wasn't developed by the people who now occupy that land! The Greeks still have no idea what all those ancient building's were used for! If they did, they would have been rebuilt just like any other race of people or moved elsewhere and rebuilt there! There was never a greek military or navy! All the so called famous ancient Greek scholars weren't greek! All of the writings are written in the Macedonian koine alphabet in the Greek spoken language, that's like picking up a copy of Shakespeare written in the Greek spoken language with the English alphabet and calling Shakespeare greek because it's the only copy that survived! There are ancient books that appear to be greek but are in fact written in the old Macedonian koine alphabet and also written in the Macedonian spoken language, they are as rare as hen's teeth but They do exist! As a priest found out in a monastery in Alexandria Egypt, he found it in his church but couldn't read it even though it looked greek to him, thinking that it might be important, he commissioned two linguistic experts to decipher it but they couldn't read it either, one of the linguists sent a couple of pictures of pages from the book to a colleague linguist in Macedonia and he was able to read it like it was written yesterday! There's a very good reason why the Greek alphabet resembles the Slavic Macedonian alphabet... There are 3 different Macedonian alphabets The earliest known Macedonian alphabet is the Sanskrit alphabet which can also be found as the middle text on the Rosetta Stone... It's not Egyptian demotic as is currently claimed! The Macedonians have been in Europe since the last major ice age ended and has had plenty of time to become who they are today and all that they have achieved, the only other nation that actually achieved an empire close to the size of the Macedonian empire is the British! They said that history repeats, and they say that those who seldom forget history are deemed to repeat it to which I would add "without knowing it". Had the Macedonian empire not collapsed, eventually they would have worked out electricity and the rest would have been history... Just imagine how far into the future we would have been today? People only get so far before war sets in and set's people back.... The Romans were really destructive in nature... You just haven't seen it yet and when you do, you can't unsee it!

Bed-why-air

LOL This guy is complaining about how poor old Augustinus left his fingerprints on the bowl. How awful! :-) I wonder how many Asian potters are laughing their a**es off or rolling in their graves at this show of egregious self-importance. I did a little research on Guy de la Bedoyere and as far as I can tell he's never actually created a pottery artifact himself; book knowledge out the wazoo and zero experience in the actual art.

Great stuff, having these highly informative uploads, I'm sure they will have their own virtual journey much like the artifacts themselves and bring much joy of 'discovery.'

hello I love the nice video very nice and happy and friendly

Fascinating! Thank you.

This for the upload. This was terrific.

Excellent content, MORE LIKE THIS PLEASE!

Guy, fabulous, I had my university students watch this video, so post more.

Fascinating! Now I want to collect some Samian ware!

thanks for another great video Guy I do miss time team

Thanks for the upload Guy another brilliant and really informative video, it’s mind blowing that something manufactured 2000 years ago is still in that condition baring the finger marks of the person who made it

Very informative and interesting video, Guy. Thanks for making and uploading this.

Thank you for such a clear, concise guide, Guy. Lots of pottery is turning up on one of my sites, virtually all grey ware with only one piece of Samian ware, so thanks to your information I'm thinking the site likely dates later than early third century.

I love these videos. Thanks for updating your channel. Been a fan since the time team days.

Listening to you on time team was always interesting like your videos now. Len

Excellent information well presented! Thank you

I just love these videos 😉👍🏻

Thank you I really enjoyed this video!

That is good information. Now, the first thing that comes to mind is that he is keeping it simple for people like me. But i want to know why the shapes of different bowls got their names... someone must have adopted a system and others found it useful. the second is the fassinating detective work that must have gone on to figure who was making what where and when. I now will spend the rest of the night on Google!!!