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Description: | TREASURE CASE : 2003 T193Description: A silver-gilt applied knob, inlaid with niello, from the head of a radiate-headed brooch. The knob is cast in deep relief with a strong Style I image: beneath a semi-circular border lie a pair of arching eyebrows that drop to join above a vestigial nose. Above, the V of the brows is echoed by a V-shaped element placed centrally and resting against the bold raised upper border. Above the eyebrows is a pair of deep and obliquely set eye sockets into which are inserted rods of silver with expanded ends which form staring eyes. The central axis of the mask continues to the bottom of the terminal. From it spring the moulded surrounds to a second pair of eyes, also set with rods to form either the pupils or the nostrils of a nose. The outer frame of each eye runs up towards the upper mask to form ears. A lug is cast into the terminal to attach it to the brooch frame. The back of the element is concave.Discussion: The knob would originally have been attached by its lug to the rounded frame of a radiate-headed brooch - a continental type current from the end of the 5th century. These brooches were set with a variable number of applied and integral knops which are frequently decorated with stylised animal heads. This knob does not fall into quite the same category, and would have come from an exceptional brooch with a Scandinavian character. Similar eyes are found within the corpus of Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian square-headed brooches, which also on occasion have knops on the head plate. For example, a brooch from Hauge, Norway (Hines 1997, pl. 110) provides a rare parallel for the use of inserted rods, while the eared mask is found on brooches from Børtnes, Kvåle and Sørheim, all in Norway (Sjøvold 1993, pls. 14 and 15). An example of an eared mask is also found on a gusset plate from Playford, Suffolk (West 1998, fig. 122.15). Also compare NMS-013F85. which has the same bold nostrils. Surface metal analysis at the British Museum found a silver content of approximately 94%.Date: 5th or 6th century AD.Published in the Treasure Annual Report 2003, pp. 60 and 211, no. 74.
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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