Dating in archeology through material culture: potteries, epigraphs and coins

The study of certain artifacts, pottery, coins and inscriptions, allows relative or absolute data to be established by themselves. Potteries can provide data with time frames of one or two decades, in the case of certain stamps of potteries or production workshops, and including absolutes due to the appearance of tituli picti. For its part, epigraphy, through the study of inscriptions, makes possible in many cases an absolute dating, thanks to the information collected in writing. Proof of this could be the consular dates or imperial titles that allow knowing with total accuracy the date to which the episode or event they collect mentions. The coin is a continuous document in time since the series succeed one another, in some cases for two or three hundred years, or during the life of a city as is the case of Rome. Although the date of minting is not expressly stated in the ancient coin, there are different procedures for its dating, due to the variety of existing issues and the information contained in them. It is therefore that, within the framework of archaeological research, the information provided by these materials in certain contexts, either thanks to the conjunction of the three, or by one of them, is today the main source for the establishment of chronologies or dates in the Archaeology.