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Description: | Description: Flat circular object, probably a pinhead, made from gilded silver. It is almost complete, but has a small part missing from one place on the edge. It has a central perforation with a corroded iron rivet within which is well preserved on the reverse, but more corroded on the front. The decoration is in relief, with two flat-topped border ridges surrounding the entire design, the outer narrow and the inner wider. A cross fills the centre, made up of a single border line with concave-sided and convex-ended arms (a cross patty). Within each of the arms is a relief triquetra knot, which has the pyramidal indentations characteristic of chip-carving; in each of the spandrels of the arms is a solid relief pointed-oval shape. Any decoration at the centre of the cross (e.g. a ridge encircling the rivet) is now obscured by iron corrosion.The break in the edge is at the tip of one of the pointed-oval shapes, so that if the disc is held with the break lowermost, the cross becomes a saltire. The break has removed perhaps 1-1.5mm of the diameter. The gilding extends to the surviving original edge, but the reverse is ungilded and undecorated, with small patches of iron corrosion.Dimensions: Diameter 23 mm, thickness 1 mm, weight 2.7g.Discussion and Date: A disc of this size is likely to have functioned as a pinhead, with the shaft perhaps made in one piece with the head, and lost at the break. Alternatively, it is possible that a separate shaft was held on by the central rivet and a second small rivet which has been lost at the break, although the break does not seem large enough to have been caused by a torn-away rivet securing a separate pin shaft.There are many 8th-century parallels for discoidal pinheads, including some with central rivets of a different metal which may be functional or decorative. A fairly close parallel, 30mm in diameter and with a fully riveted shaft, came from topsoil at Flixborough (Evans and Loveluck 2009, no. 561) and others can be found on the PAS database at BH-4FDFA5, NLM-53BCD4, LIN-C219D3 (with iron rivet), SWYOR-3DEE70, NLM-028751, SUR-34D906, GLO-6F0C75, DENO-BF15B8 (with triquetras), etc.These, however, all tend to have fields of interlace separated by reserved strips, and the decoration on NMS-D02F03 is unusual. It is perhaps best compared with the right-hand pin from the Witham linked-pin set, which also has four radiating pointed-oval shapes (this time apertures) forming a reserved cross with expanded ends (Webster and Backhouse 1991, no. 184). Although the right-hand pin is considered a replacement, it is not substantially later than the rest of the set, which is generally dated to the late 8th century. A similar date is likely for NMS-D02F03.
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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