During the month of October 2002 a superficial excavation was carried out in taberna VI, 15 at Herculaneum. The shop is located in front of the Casa del Salone Nero (VI, 11, 13). This area was uncovered between the 23 and the 28th of August 1961 during the exposure of the north façade and the northwest corner of Insula VI. Our study reveals that this excavation was never completed. In effect, the excavators directed by Maiuri stopped just before reaching the pavement level, leaving between 2 and 5 cm. of material from the eruption still in place. Restoration had covered these deposits. Our objective was thus to examine the pavement so as to check whether there were any structures left in place related to the commerce carried out in the shop. The excavations demonstrated that the taberna had been built after one of the earthquakes (A.D. 61 or 73-75), subdividing an earlier, larger space. An access point to the rainwater cistern filled from the atrium of the house demonstrates that the taberna was the property of the owner of the Casa del Salone Nero, who had presumably rented it out. Just before the eruption the tenant appears to have changed. He carried out various works, interrupted by the catastrophe of A.D. 79, and seems to have lived above his shop. Among the materials kept on the loft and in the channel leading to the cistern we can note a fibre basket, an amphora reused for the preparation of pigments and a heap of rope

This study which began in 2004 as part of the research programme on craft working undertaken by the Centro Jean Bérard at Naples aims to resolve some problems linked to lead working at _Herculaneum_ and _Pompeii_. During the campaigns of the last years the activities carried out in the workshop of the _plumbarius_, incorporated in the façade of the House of the Black Walls, were identified, as was the evolution of the latter’s relationship with this _domus_. The data from the trenches dug in the three rooms at the front of the House of the Black Walls provided an interpretation of the main occupation phases of room VI, 12, which at the moment of the eruption housed the workshop for the transformation of lead. Through an analysis of mortar sample composition it was established that the workshop was installed within the pre-existing _domus_ during the decade beginning in 70 A.D. Moreover, an intensive study of the excavation archive provided an understanding of both the structures and the tools used for metal working, despite the great errors of restoration made during the 1960s. An examination of the metal sections taken from Pompeian objects provide the basis for the reconstruction of some techniques used by lead workers in the cities buried by _Vesuvius_. As regards the other two workshops (VI,14 and VI, 15), stratigraphic excavation has shown that from the Augustan period until 62 A.D. they formed a single unit. They were only divided after the earthquake. Other structures linked to the functioning of this first workshop have been identified but their interpretation remains uncertain.