Treatment of an Ancient
Roman Glass Vessel
4th - 6th century CE
Roman (Syro-Palestinian)
Late Imperial Roman or Early Byzantine
This ancient glass vessel is in the collection of a museum in Lebanon, Syria. A large blast resulting from a terror attack had broken the vessel into 5 fragments and created several blind cracks which compromised the structural integrity of the object.
Initial Condition
The weathering layers on the vessel, a testament to its age, were first consolidated using a low concentration acrylic adhesive solubilized in acetone, applied with a fine brush to flood the delaminating areas and permeate the cracks.
The vessel was then reassembled. First, the break edges of all fragments were cleaned before a ~30% w/v concentration of adhesive resin was brushed onto the break edges for piece-by-piece reassembly.
Recreation of a Loss
on the Upper Handle
A small loss on the tip of one of the handles was visually distracting, so a small fill was made by dyeing Hyxtal NYL-1 epoxy resin with Orasol dyes. The blue-green color and transparency of the fill were refined by adding dry pigments adhered with a water-soluble synthetic resinand a small amount of Golden liquid acrylic paint, including the color-interference variety.