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Description: | An incomplete cast copper alloy dress hook/ clothes fastener, dating to the Post Medieval period, between AD 1600 - 1700 (length: 30mm; width: 13mm; thickness: 1.5mm; weight: 1.4g).At the top of the artefact, there is a rectangular suspension/ attachment loop. This is integrally connected to the main body of the artefact, which is sub-circular in plan and flat in side section. Although badly corroded, the central body has a decorative beaded outer border (thickness: 1.5mm). The inner decoration within the border consists of four visible sub-oval recesses (approximate diameter of recesses: 2mm), with a further possible two recesses hidden underneath a layer of copper alloy corrosion. These recesses circle around a central area, although it is impossible to identify further decoration due to the level of wear on the artefact. The incomplete and integral cast copper alloy hook (length: 11mm; width: 2mm; thickness: 1mm) is broken before it would have originally curled round to the back of the artefact. The back of the dress hook is flat and undecorated. Overall, the dress hook is in a worn, poor and corroded condition with none of the original patina remaining.In the publication 'Norwich Households: Medieval and Post-Medieval Finds from the Norwich Survey Excavations 1971-78', 1993 (page 17), Margeson states that the dress hook or hooked tag 'seems to have undergone a revival in the 16th century, when cast, highly decorated and often openwork examples were popular. They, like their Saxon equivalents, were clearly used for a variety of purposes associated with clothes fastening and accessories'. From material excavated in Amsterdam, some of these tags were 'used at each end of a decorative chain, perhaps for fastening a cloak. The sharp hooks were probably used with cords or hooked straight into the material, rather than with "eyes". The examples from Amsterdam come from late 16th/ early 17th-century contexts' (page 17).
Original Image | Publisher: | http://finds.org.uk | Source: | Portable Antiquities | Identifier: | http://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/r... | Go to resource |
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