Rare Roman Glass Identified in England

GLOUCESTERSHIRE, ENGLAND—According to a report in The Guardian, a patterned green glass fragment unearthed at the site of Chedworth Roman Villa in southwest England has been identified as an 1,800-year-old piece of a bottle shaped like a fish that was made near the Black Sea in what is now Ukraine. The bottle is thought to have held an exotic perfume. Only one other example of such a bottle is known. “To have found that it is the only one of its type so far discovered in Roman Britain adds to our knowledge of the importance of Chedworth Roman Villa,” said archaeologist Nancy Grace of Britain’s National Trust. For more on archaeology in Gloucestershire, go to “Letter from England: The Scientist’s Garden.”