Le bottiglie kropfflasche: testimonianze dal monastero di San Severo di Classe (Ravenna)

In the Middle Ages the ecclesiastical and monastic élites often took on a leading role in the distribution of goods: thanks to donations, on the local marketplaces they could find a huge quantity of products, which today we can rediscover thanks to archaeology. This is the case, for instance, in Classe (Ravenna), where, during a ten-year archaeological campaign conducted in the basilica of Saint Severus, ceramic, glass and metal objects were unearthed, that were connected to the life of the Monastery (9th-15th century AD). Among the glass finds, a significant group of fragments belonged to bottles with a ring-shaped bulge called kroppflasche, one of the most unusual and less known forms in the late Middle Ages. These bottles are characterized by a bulge at the end of the neck and a vertical ribs on the body, and have been found sporadically from Greece to northern Europe in 13th-14th century contexts. Through comparisons with published examples of kroppflasche, the present study is intended as a starting point for further research to be conducted on the production and trade of these objects, with the aim to understanding their use and consumption in the monastic community of the monastery of Saint Severus in Classe (Ravenna).