File:Book clasp Illustration by, Dom Andrews (FindID 71625).jpg

English: Copper-alloy book-clasp. The attachment end is rectangular, 33 mm long and 28 mm wide. The front and sides of the attachment end are cast in one piece and there is a thin sheet backplate, now incomplete, soldered on. The front has two small circular rivet holes, one in each outer corner; one of these retains a copper-alloy rivet. It is decorated with a panel of fine cross-hatching surrounded by an engraved line. On the panel, and crossing over at the bottom into the undecorated border, are three reserved black-letter initials. They read xpc (in lower case) with an abbreviation mark over the p; this can be read as an abbreviation for Christ in Greek (chi-rho-sigma). The top and bottom edges have a slight bevel, across which are cut two pairs of nicks, one at either end.
Attached to the rectangular end is a central lozengiform element, 23 mm wide, which is built up in steps to form a rose motif. There is a central four-petalled rose, on a square base, which in turn sits on the lozengiform base which may represent the rose’s sepals. The detail of the rose is provided by short engraved lines. On the reverse of the lozengiform element, the sheet backplate continues and is pierced with a central circular hole 3.5 mm in diameter; the backplate is a little bent around the hole.
One of the corners of the lozenge is extended out to form a solid-cast and very stylised animal head, with ridged brow and open jaws pierced with a 3 mm diameter hole. The hole runs transversely across the width of the book-clasp, rather than through its thickness. The animal head is decorated with short grooves down the back of the ridged brow and down the nose. The book-clasp is 69 mm in total length, and weighs 31.03g.
Book-clasps of this type would have been attached to a strap stitched to one cover, and fixed over a peg attached to the opposite cover; this example has clearly been damaged by trying to jam it onto the peg. The hole in the animal head at the tip probably held a cord which could be used to pull the clasp off the peg. They come into use in the second half of the 14th century, but judging from the style of the lettering this one could alternatively be 15th century. It is very neatly made, and would have come from a large book.