This little pot is an extraordinary archeological find. Just six centimetres across and five centimetres high, and containing a cream made from animal fat, starch and tin oxide, it was found in an ancient drain at the site of a Roman temple complex in London.
Marks left by the last fingers to use the cream pot are still visible on the lid ! Fashionable women of Roman Britain used it to bestow a pale and appealing look after their session in the baths. Someone would certainly have been in hot water for losing the jar !
White face paint was fashionable in Roman times and this colour would normally have been derived from lead acetate, but for Romans exploiting British mineral resources, the tin would have been a more than acceptable substitute.
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