A rare piece of Jewish material culture was recovered in Lisbon during the archaeological works carried out between 2014 and 2016 on the riverfront plot formerly occupied by the Armazéns Sommer, at Rua do Cais de Santarém (today integrated into the Áurea Museum by Eurostars). The object is a circular ceramic stamp, preserved as a fragment, whose reconstruction suggests an original diameter of about 9 cm and an average thickness of roughly 1.5 cm. It was found in deposits dated to the transition from the 4th to the 5th century CE, within a late Roman urban setting close to a narrow street leading to a fountain and cistern, near the line of the Roman wall.

The stamp’s significance lies in its iconography. On the working face, the authors identify a schematized menorah, originally with seven branches, and, beside it, a lulav motif associated with Jewish ritual practice. While the menorah could, in certain contexts, be ambiguously adopted, the lulav is understood as a distinctly Jewish symbol, strengthening the interpretation that the stamp belonged to a Jewish user or a Jewish-controlled context. The stamp is therefore discussed as a practical instrument for marking perishable goods, plausibly bread. In particular, the study argues that it could have been used to imprint unleavened bread, mazzah, functioning as a visible kosher identifier for goods produced outside the household, where communal or commercial production required clear signals of ritual compliance.

Beyond the object itself, the stamp contributes to broader discussions about Jewish presence in late Roman Olisipo. Direct archaeological indicators of Jewish life in the far western provinces are scarce, and this piece stands out for linking symbolic language, ritual practice, and everyday provisioning within an urban context on Lisbon’s Tagus waterfront.