Syrian blue pottery fragments found at Russian archaeological site

Russia’s TASS news agency quoted Sergei Busharov, deputy director of the Institute of Byzantine and Black Sea History and Archaeology at Sevastopol State University, as saying that fragments of Syrian blue pottery had been discovered. The pieces date back to the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt and Syria and reached the region via the Syrian coast.

The fragments were found during archaeological excavations at the ancient site of Tauric Chersonesus in the city of Sevastopol, in the south of the Crimean Peninsula.

Busharov explained that the pottery’s most distinctive feature is its bright blue colour, produced using cobalt pigment. The material was unknown in Byzantium and the northern Black Sea region during that period, giving Syrian pottery its distinctive character and status among imported goods.

The discovery highlights the presence of Syrian crafts in trade networks linking the Levantine coast with the Black Sea region. It also provides archaeological evidence of the extent of commercial exchange between the two regions during the Mamluk era.