Olla (Roman pot)

In ancient Roman culture, the olla (archaic Latin: aula or aulla; Greek: χύτρα, chytra)[1][2][3] is a squat, rounded pot or jar.

In the typology of ancient Roman pottery, the olla is a vessel distinguished by its rounded "belly", typically with no or small handles or at times with volutes at the lip, and made within a Roman sphere of influence; the term olla may also be used for Etruscan[4] and Gallic examples, or Greek pottery found in an Italian setting.

Unlike the aenum or cauldron, which hung over the fire from chains, the olla had a flat bottom for resting on a hot surface, though it might also be placed directly on logs or coals in rustic cookery.

[18] The vessel is mentioned, for instance, in Livy's account of a sign (prodigium) that manifested divine displeasure: the official presiding over the sacrifice himself poured the cooking liquid out of the olla in order to inspect the remaining entrails, which were intact except for the mysteriously liquified liver.

[19] Ollae figured in the rituals of the Arval Brethren, the "Brothers of the Fields" who constituted a college of priests dating from Rome's archaic period.

An olla appears in the right hand of the Gallo-Roman mallet god Sucellus ; the shape of the fragment suggests that the pot itself might have been an olla
Ollae of varying shapes in a reconstruction of a Roman kitchen; top shelf, and on the rack over the fire
Gallic mallet god with olla , perhaps Sucellus