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Description: | A cast copper alloy bow brooch of most unusual form and probably of 5th century AD date. The brooch has a a small D-shaped headplate, a widely curved rounded bow with ten equally-spaced projections down the centre, and an upturned foot. The head plate has a semi-circular knob at its apex and is decorated with four deeply incised double-ring-and-dot motifs which lie over an engraved lozenge (above) and a pair of horizontal engraved lines (below). On the reverse of the headplate is a B-shaped projection with two holes, one in each of the upper and lower lobes, to accommodate the iron spring and chord, a small amount of which survives in a corroded condition. The bow is a low triangle in cross-section, and is decorated at the top and bottom with pairs of double-ring-and-dot motifs. At the top, a transverse engraved line separates the pair of ring-and-dot motifs from the rest of the bow. Below this, five similar motifs are set down each side of the bow and there is a further ring-and-dot on the catchplate (making 19 in all on the entire brooch). Much of the surface of the lower part of the bow is missing owing to corrosion.The bow narrows towards the catchplate, which is set on the reverse of a sharp turn making an sharply upturned foot which ends in an expanded circular button-like terminal. Much of the curve of the catchplate has been lost.Sophia Adams and Justine Bayley have seen images of this brooch and have given much useful advice. Sophia Adams feels that although it has features reminiscent of Iron Age material, Iron Age brooches are on the whole less solidly made than this example and it is unlikely to be of this date. Justine Bayley has drawn attention to a group of 5th-century brooches with upturned feet published by Böhme (1986, Abb. 43) as his Typ Glaston; one of these, from Mucking, also has a rounded headplate. Schulze-Dörlamm (1986, Abb. 45) illustrates a brooch of her Bügelknopffibeln Typ Grepault, found in Martigny, Switzerland, with the knobs down the bow and the upturned foot ending in a button, but with a long catchplate and without the semi-circular headplate. The three examples of Typ Grepault are all from the Alps, and none from closed grave contexts, but comparison with Schulze-Dörlamm's Typ Gurina suggests a date of late 5th or early 6th century (1986, 668).At present, then, the available information for this very unusual brooch suggests a date in the 5th or early 6th century, and either a late Roman, sub-Roman or Continental Germanic cultural milieu.
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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