Household Goods, Crafts and Local Exchange in the Kingdom of Pontus

Communities in the Pontic region obtained food, vessels and cloth through work that connected households with fields, workshops and markets. The southern Black Sea coast offered harbours and fisheries; river valleys and inland estates supplied agricultural produce. These resources moved through settlements governed by the Mithridatid kings until the Roman conquest in 63 BCE.

Cıngırt Kayası, a hilltop site near Fatsa, provides a closer view of the objects involved. Occupation began in the reign of Mithridates VI and continued under Roman and Byzantine rule. Its late Hellenistic finds include decorated bowls and textile tools; objects dated broadly to the first century BCE belong to the period spanning the kingdom’s final decades and the beginning of Roman control.

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Spinning thread and weaving cloth

Excavators recovered spindle whorls and loom weights at Cıngırt Kayası. A spindle twisted prepared fibres into thread. The whorl, a small perforated disc fitted to the shaft, added weight and helped sustain rotation. Drawing out fibres while maintaining twist produced a continuous thread suitable for weaving.

On a warp-weighted loom, clay weights hung from bundles of vertical threads, called the warp. A weaver passed a cross-thread, the weft, between them and compacted successive rows. The weights kept the warp under tension, making it easier to open alternate spaces for the cross-thread.

Published examples include pyramidal and disc-shaped weights dated to the first century BCE. Their different masses mattered to the tension applied to the threads. Experimental study of the finds has explored what varieties of fabric these arrangements could produce. The tools reveal decisions about thread and tension within a craft whose wooden equipment and finished cloth rarely survived.

Vessels for serving and drinking

Hellenistic relief bowls from Cıngırt Kayası have rounded bodies and raised plant or figured designs on the outside. Such bowls served drinking and table use. Their decoration came from a mould, allowing a potter to reproduce a patterned surface without carving every finished vessel individually.

A maker first prepared the mould with impressions of stamps and added details. Clay placed inside took up the design. As the bowl dried it shrank enough to be removed; the rim could be finished before the vessel was coated and fired. The process joined repeatable equipment with individual adjustments to the shape and surface.

A decorated bowl found at the settlement need not have been manufactured there. Comparing clay, forms and motifs helps researchers trace its relationship with producing centres elsewhere. The finds place the community within a market for Hellenistic tableware, alongside objects serving less decorative storage and cooking needs.

Fishing and coastal provision

Cıngırt Kayası overlooked routes near the coast and a river valley. Its excavated objects include hooks and lead weights interpreted as fishing equipment. A weight on a line helped carry a hook down through the water; weights along the lower edge of a net helped hold it in position.

Fish plates in the late Hellenistic pottery add a table setting to this evidence of capture. Equipment, vessels and access to water connect several stages of provision: obtaining fish, transporting the catch and preparing or serving it. Fishing could supply people living away from the immediate shoreline as well as those working beside it.

Land, estates and markets

The Pontic landscape supported grain, fruit, vines and livestock in different districts. Productive valleys joined fields with routes to towns, while woodland supplied construction and ship timber. Moving bulky supplies required containers, animals or boats as well as the labour of cultivation and processing.

Comana Pontica joined a sanctuary of the Anatolian goddess Ma with land, a resident population and an important market. Strabo, writing in the early Roman period, describes merchants from Armenia and visitors arriving for festivals from both towns and countryside. Their gatherings created recurring demand for provisions and other goods.

At a sanctuary estate, agricultural income supported the institution and the people under its authority. A market brought additional sellers and buyers into the same place. These linked activities explain why an inland sacred centre could become an important point of exchange.

Money and the movement of goods

Bronze issues bearing the names of communities such as Amisos circulated alongside royal silver. Coins identified an issuing authority through lettering and images. Producing them required metal, engraved dies and repeated striking of prepared blanks.

A shared monetary environment helped people transfer value without moving the same quantities of goods at each payment. The movement of containers and tableware reveals other parts of exchange: things made in one place could be transported, sold and used in another. Local craft work and regional trade met in the objects handled within settlements.

The Roman conquest changed the authorities claiming land, revenues and allegiance. It came within the life of tools and forms that could remain useful for many years. Dating the excavated objects therefore makes it possible to follow work across this transition while keeping the final royal decades distinct from later developments.

For the wider setting, see Life in the Pontic Kingdom: Coastal Cities and Inland Communities.