gems, ancient jewelry, early metallurgy, gold, Carthage, Roman empire, British Museum, Louvre, vandals, Byzantine jewelry, garnets

Roman North Africa has yielded very few discoveries of silver plate and jewelry. The most spectacular treasure is the small group of objects found on the hill of Byrsa, at Carthage, in the mid-19th century. Today divided between the Musée du Louvre in Paris and the British Museum in London, it consists of a table service and some pieces of jewelry. Although the extent of the treasure is relatively modest, this set, the burial of which can be dated to the 5th century BC, provides a good illustration of the precious metal artifacts which might have been in the possession of notables from Roman North Africa during Late Antiquity. An inscription carefully engraved on one of the plates doubtless refers to one of these families, the Cresconii. Apart from its testimony to Roman society in North Africa, this treasure contains some very inventive pieces like a patera decorated with a frog, as well as plate which is some of the most outstanding from Late Antiquity. Some of the objects are characterized by a high quality of execution and metalwork (bowls with lids and small spoons), others by their relief (bowls decorated with pastoral scenes). The provenance of the different objects is still hard to establish (one of them has a Greek inscription referring to its weight), but the Carthage treasure is an important landmark in the exploration of the history of Roman precious metalwork and shows hitherto little-known aspects of the civilization of Roman Africa in Late Antiquity.