The Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, New York, houses thousands of glass beads acquired in the early 1970s from Alastair Lamb. These materials represent Lamb's research at Kuala Selinsing, Pengkalan Bujang, and Johor Lama (all in Malaysia), and Takua Pa (Thailand), spanning almost two millennia of interactions across the Bay of Bengal interaction sphere. Laser ablation inductively coupled mass spectrometric (LA‐ICP‐MS) analysis of a subset of material attributed to these sites provides significant comparative data that elucidates the patterns of glass production within the region alongside imported materials from the Middle East and China over the longue durée .

Following an initial micro-XRF assay, 42 samples of glass from the twentieth-century excavations of the fourthcentury CE production site at Jalame, Israel, were selected and analysed by EPMA, with subsets for trace elements by LA-ICP-MS (n=29 samples) and for Hf isotopes by MC-ICP-MS (n=6). Comparison of major elements for ten samples originally measured in Brill (1988) was good, although the earlier SiO2 values are slightly high. Analyses of furnace debris and contaminated glass imply that glass furnaces were made of, or lined with a limerich material, leading to contamination by CaO, rather than Al2O3. This confirms that higher alumina contents measured for Jalame glass relative to Roman Mn-decolourised glass of first-third century Europe are significant and it is suggested that the source of the earlier Roman glass lies further North on the eastern Mediterranean coast. A wide range of trace elements are shown to have entered the glass with the addition of manganese, so caution should be exercised when interpreting trace element and isotopic data on glass with significant amounts of Mn, although the effects on REE and some of the lithophiles most often used in provenancing appear minor or insignificant in Jalame glass with MnO below 1.3 wt%. For example, the hafnium isotope composition of the Jalame material does not appear to have been significantly affected and falls within the previously determined Levantine range, distinguishable from Egyptian glass. Associated trace elements indicate that two Mn sources were exploited and this raises the possibility of further investigation of Mn sources in early glass production. The wide range of added manganese suggests problems in obtaining a homogeneous batch and it is suggested that (a) a single initially inhomogeneous furnace load melted to a range of colours, which were subsequently coloursorted as chunks, and/or (b) the recycling of poorly fused manganese-decolourised glass into later manganesefree batches resulted in the observed variation. The cobalt pigment used was the high-nickel late antique type and allows the introduction of this source to be pushed back from the sixth to the fourth century CE. The use of antimony in glassmaking ceased at around the same time, and it is speculated that these changes were related.

Abstract Glassmaking has traditionally not been considered a major accomplishment of Greek craft, but new research and archaeological discoveries have established Greek contributions to the history of glass. While there is no single ancient Greek term for glass, the term ὕαλος (hyalos) refers to a transparent, hard, luminous material, such as glass or rock crystal. In the 6th century bce, core-formed glass perfume and cosmetic containers began to appear throughout the Mediterranean, particularly in funerary contexts and dedicatory assemblages. Later, colourless glass, cast in moulds and sagged over forms and often decorated with gilding or cutting, appears as a major technical innovation in the late 5th to early 4th century bce. Although no workshops have been found, Rhodes and Macedonia were likely important producers of these products. The Hellenistic period saw a gradual diversification of forms, expansion of colours, and experimentation with new techniques. Always important luxury trade goods, glass drinking vessels and small objects such as beads and gaming pieces become more accessible to a wider segment of the population by the beginning of the 1st century bce, an important prelude to the spread of glassblowing under the Roman empire.

In 2016, The Corning Museum of Glass acquired a stained glass painting by the noted late 18th-century stained glass artist Eglington Margaret Pearson (English, d. 1823). Although Pearson is now relatively obscure, she and her husband, James, participated in the Society of Artists, serving an ecclesiastical, noble, and royal clientele. The popularity of glass painting in Georgian England reflects a larger disposition toward the play of light in interior spaces, using painted transparencies of glass, paper, or textiles. The new acquisition is a rendering of Guido Reni's L'Aurora, a fresco painting from early 17th-century Rome. It was copied extensively in a variety of media throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. Historical and archival sources document the purchase, by the 11th duke of Norfolk, of a copy of Reni's L'Aurora by Eglington Margaret Pearson in 1795. The painting was displayed at Arundel Castle throughout the 19th century, but it does not appear in a 1917 inventory of the castle's holdings. We suggest that the painting now in Corning is probably the same painting purchased by the duke of Norfolk and displayed at Arundel Castle-a painting presumed lost for over a century. Extensive conservation treatment has revealed new insights into and an appreciation for Pearson's luminous painting techniques and those of late 18th-century stained glass in Britain.

Among the most dramatic changes in ancient material culture was the widespread adoption of glass vessels for tableware and storage during the 1st c. B.C. and 1st c. A.D. As shown by the quantity of glass finds from occupation sites of the Imperial era, glassware was much more prominent in daily life than it had been previously. This shift occurred concurrently with the widespread adoption of glassblowing. This change in consumer behavior points to a complex process of experimentation, development, and gradual adaptation on the part of both producers and consumers. The transition from centuries-old technologies of core-forming, casting and sagging to blowing required a complete reconfiguration of every stage of glass production, from the increased supply of raw material to the development of new tools and workshop space, and in the training of craftsmen.

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Recent advances in network theory have facilitated the collection and analysis of archaeological data in new ways, with significant implications for the detection of social networks and transmission of information in the ancient world. These new models invite a reassessment of the diffusion of information and organization of artistic production that has long been based on physical mobility and familial organization of workshops. This article applies network analysis to a corpus of sculptors’ signatures from the Hellenistic Aegean in order to test the scale and frequency of mobility and significance of social relationships in sculptural production. Signatures, with their formulaic patronyms and toponyms, reveal complex personal relationships between sculptors, their collaborators, and the places they lived and worked. In turn, these affiliations shed light upon physical and conceptual connections among sculptors over time and space. Network modeling reveals that communication among clusters of sculptors working in different production centers fluctuates over the Hellenistic period, with the optimal period for homogeneous cultural expression coinciding with the small world properties of the network around the mid-2nd century BC, when a few key itinerant individuals create bridging ties between centers. This study yields a more holistic model for sculptural production during the Hellenistic period in which the duration, distance, and frequency of individual itinerancy is less common than has been assumed. Direct familial relationships emerge as less important for workshop organization than a common city or region of origin.