Portable Ovens

[Mithras]

I've read several references to portable ovens in connection with the army and other groups (civillians) but never seen a photo or drawing or reconstruction. Can anyone point me in the right direction? One or more references talk about portable ovens (clay or iron) in connection with folding frying pans, commenting that the pans could be carried inside the oven.

Where can I find a portable oven? I want one!

[Viventius]

I am not aware of any evidence for portable clay ovens in Britannia; would love to know if there is. Alex Croom (Quinta) has used two dishes, one covering the other, and that seems to work well. I've got two Roman ceramic dishes and will bring them to one of our shows so you can a go with them, if you like.

Other methods of heating food: there are a few fragments of possible braziers around the country, but that's about it. Braziers seem to be used more on the Continent than in Britannia.

There are two really weird things at Chesters Museum that have sometimes been intepreted as braziers:



They could easily be like tazza (as per the 'Gladiatrix' burials - 'ritual' incense burner thingies). Here's at example of a tazza:

[Carlton Bach]

I don't think you would find portable ovens. The evidence from Roman Italy is that you have a lot of 'testudo'-style baking covers for use in open fires or hearths, so there's really no need (wou can make a fire without eXtra equipment). Such baking covers are common in Britain in later eras, too (often (mis)identified as 'curfews') and can be had at ridiculous prices from 'country-style' furniture suppliers, though an inverted flowerpot works just as well.

However, I recall having seen (and not photographed ) a terracotta brazier in a museum in Rome. It was square, fitted with holes along the side for ventilation, and had supports for a pot on top. Similar items are still in use in North Africa today, and in Joan Alcock's book 'Food in Roman Britain' (Tempus Publishing, Stroud 2001) there are pictures of members of the V Gallorum (3rd century re-enactors) using one of these to make flatbread. THis is something you might want to look at.

[Viventius]

Cohors V Gallorum are also known as ... Quinta! But Paul knows that

Their website is here http://www.quintagallorum.co.uk/

[mcbishop]

The portable ovens available are simply the run-of-the-mill coarse ware cooking vessels. Plenty of these have been found with signs of external burning showing their use in cooking and lids are a common find. They can form, essentially, a Dutch oven. Together with the rampart-back bread ovens found in both permanent and temporary installations and gridirons used over open fires, all the soldiers' cooking needs could be met from known artefacts without recourse to 'special' portable ovens.

A good starting point is

J.P. Gillam, Types of Roman Coarse Pottery Vessels in northern Britain, 3rd edition, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1970

for vessel forms in Britain. Other provinces have similar traditions. There was a form of portable oven known as the clibanus, but I know of no examples in British military contexts (but then I'm not a pot-wobbler, so that may not mean much).

Mike Bishop

[Viventius]

This is what I meant by dishes:




And this is how they can be used:





The dishes were made by Andrew MacDonald of the Pot Shop in Lincoln.

On the subject of pottery in Roman Britain, Pau Tyers website is really useful: http://www.potsherd.uklinux.net/