This group has multiple variants. The clay groundmass can range from light red-brown to a darker brick red color in PPL, reddish-orange to brown in XPL, and is optically inactive. The silt fraction of the marly red clay represents ca. 5–8% of the fabric, and is dominated by calcareous material, quartz, and ferruginous nodules/iron oxides with occasional feldspars and heavy minerals. Voids are frequent and can be vesicular or vugh shaped, usually the latter, ranging from 200–1400µm and taking up ca. 10% of the fabric. The largest voids are planar and might be the remnants of burnt-out plant matter (Quinn 2022: Fig. 4.39). A small amount of foraminifera are present in nearly all samples, including Globigerina and some benthic forams, perhaps Bolivina. Aplastic inclusions are very fine to medium sand sized grains and moderately sorted. They are sub-angular to well-rounded in shape and make up about 10–20% of PG4. The larger calcareous inclusions are distinctly more rounded than the fine–very fine sand sized grains as well as other mineral types. Micritic limestone inclusions are dominant, roughly 50% of the total. Red inclusions (in PPL and XPL), many of them serpentine (iron-stained or metamorphosed?), are common, ca. 15%. Plagioclase feldspar and monocrystalline quartz grains are about 10%. Mica, mica-schist and radiolarian chert are present in small quantities. The most characteristic element of this petrofabric is the preponderance of large, well-rounded carbonates alongside bright red inclusions.

The abundance of carbonates and red grains (serpentine or metamorphic rock?) in a calcareous clay indicates that this fabric was produced from marly clay and calcareous (limestone, chalk, etc.) lithology with some outcrops of ophiolitic and/or metamorphic rock. A recently published assemblage of LRA1 (and other types in the Late Roman typological series) samples from a collection of sites in the northeast Iberian Peninsula was dominated by a well-represented and internally diverse petro-fabric that matches this one (Fabric 1 of Fantuzzi, Ontiveros, and Reynolds 2017; equivalent to Fabric ‘ORI-1’ of Fantuzzi et al. 2020). The researchers suggest that this fabric—which included LRA1 types 1A and 1B—was produced in Cilicia or north Syria, but not Cyprus (Fantuzzi, Ontiveros, and Reynolds 2017: 106). A homogenous petrofabric group of LRA1s from the sites Itanos and Gortyn on Crete show many similarities to PG4, especially the red-brown clay with bright red inclusions, limestone, quartz, and occasional microfossils (Poulou-Papadimitriou and Nodarou 2014: 877, Figs. 18, 19). This group matches textual descriptions of the locally produced LRA1s from Elaiussa Sebaste (Burragato et al. 2007: 692–693) and LRA1 sample Sepphoris 77.1490.1 was suggested to be an Elaiussa product by petrographers studying that assemblage (Murat Eroğlu, pers. comm.). The local geology of the site is characterized by Eocene to Middle Miocene carbonates and Quaternary sediment along the coast (Yemenicioglu and Tunc 2013: Fig. 2; Şafak et al. 2023). The Şıhlar and Silifke formations just north of Elaiussa is composed of “limestones, clayey limestones, and marls” which contain quartz and hematite (Şafak et al. 2023: 1), aligning with the dominance of calcareous material of this group. These predominantly limestone formations are underlaid and occasionally imbricated with ophiolitic melanges from the Cretaceous period, and dotted with benthic and planktonic foraminifera, particularly of the Globigerinidae family (Şafak et al. 2023: 3–5).

This petrofabric is likely produced in Rough Cilicia. It was utilized by potters operating in the 4th–7th c. CE to make transport amphoras like the Late Roman 1 type. Examples of this fabric are found in regional centers in the southern Levant, including Ashkelon and Sepphoris. No ceramic workshops have yet been located that produced vessels with this fabric, but it is possible that Elaiussa Sebaste is one such site.

Zippori (Israel/Galilee)

Ashkelon (Israel-Palestinian Authority/Southern Coastal Plain)