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Description: | Circular mount, 27-28 mm in diameter, made from cast copper alloy. Around the edge are 19 projecting rounded lobes. Moving inwards, the next element is a deep concave ring which is divided into three by three short radiating ridges. There are traces of gilding between the lobes and in the base of these three deep channels; two of the channels have a circular hole drilled through them. The centre of the mount is divided into a central circular sunken field and two shallowly sunken concentric rings. There is a small area of deep red enamel in the central field which spreads in two or three places out of the dot, over the shallow cell wall and up to the next cell wall. This is very odd; what is the point of having separate cells if the enamel is run over the cell wall? The reverse is slightly hollowed, and has two patches of grey metal, probably solder, which fill the spaces between the two circular holes. The holes and the solder must be fixing devices, but could both possibly be the result of re-use. The date of this object is difficult to work out. Outer lobes and enamelling are both characteristic not only of Roman brooches but also of middle to late Anglo-Saxon brooches. Roman glass centre-boss brooches have outer concave fields which are gilded, not enamelled, but neither Roman nor Anglo-Saxon brooches tend to have this tripartite division of the outer field. One of the main problems in dating this object is that it may have been re-used as a mount, and its original function is unknown. Although it could in theory be a remodelled brooch (with the pin fixing gear obscured by the solder) it is too chunky and heavy to be a Roman brooch, and it is not exactly right for any known middle or late Anglo-Saxon brooch type either. The reason that it has been classified as 'unidentified object' is because it is very uncertain even what the mount might have been used on - a box, a book, a cart, furniture, etc. All in all it is a bit of a mystery object! | Format: | text/html | License: | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ | Publisher: | The Portable Antiquities Scheme | Rights holder: | The Portable Antiquities Scheme | Subjects: | archaeology | Temporal: | 43
1066 | Source: | Portable Antiquities | Identifier: | http://www.finds.org.uk/database/artefac... | Language: | en-GB | Format: | text/html | Go to resource |
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