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Dressel 2-4 wine amphora

Second half of the 1st century B.C. - late 1st century A.D.
Florence, Museo Archeologico Nazionale
Inv. s.n.i./ no inv. no.

 

Probably produced at Tarragona, this type of amphora was widely diffused in Italy. It documents the growth of the provincial wine trade, which stretched as far as the borders of the known world. Traces of it have even been found in India.

APPROFONDIMENTI

Dressel 2-4 amphorae

In the second half of the 1st century B.C., the Dressel 2-4 type, inspired by the amphorae of Kos, where one of the finest wines in the Mediterranean was produced, marked notable technological progress. They were in fact lighter in weight than the Dressel 1 type, which they gradually replaced. They were produced mainly by the same workshops in Tyrrhenian central Italy that had fabricated the Graeco-Italic and then the Dressel 1 amphorae. Provincial production centres arose as well, especially in Spain, in the provinces of Tarraconese and Betica, whose products rapidly flooded Gaul and Italy.