File:The arts in early England (1903) (14784732405).jpg

Identifier: artsinearlyengla03brow (find matches)
Title: The arts in early England
Year: 1903 (1900s)
Authors: Brown, G. Baldwin (Gerard Baldwin), 1849-1932 Webster, A. Blyth (Adam Blyth), 1882-1956 Sexton, Eric H. L. (Eric Hyde Lord), 1902-1980
Subjects: Art Architecture Architecture, Medieval Church architecture Crosses Decoration and ornament, Celtic Inscriptions, Runic
Publisher: London, J. Murray
Contributing Library: Wellesley College Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries

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t of view byfar the most important. A discussion of these types from thepoint of view of the forms evolved in the course of theirdevelopment will now follow, a beginning being made with thesafety pin type. This owes its name to the fact of its reintroduction quite 1 For an example of this see later on (p. 315)- THE SAFETY PIN TYPE 249 in our own time for the sake of securing the young of thehuman species from its natural enemy the insistent pin-point.The invention is quite three thousand years old, and theevolution of the type can be traced from the very earliestbeginnings, while all through its long history we find primitiveforms from time to time recurring. If we turn over to-day aheap of the common safety pins of modern commerce we shallsoon find one that consists in nothing but a single length ofwire that can be straightened out till it becomes again whatit was at first, a long pin with a point but with no head. Suchpins are represented in finds from the earliest ages of metal and
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Fig. 10.—Below, early fibula of the Pesciera type, natural size ;above, fibula from Kingston, Kent, enlarged. are substitutes for the neolithic pins of bone, or the still moreprimitive thorn, with which Tacitus, who was possibly theoriz-ing, tells us the Germans of the Hinterland fastened theirclothing.1 To prevent such a pin from slipping out therewould at some time or another present itself the device ofbending or doubling over the upper part of it and giving it acatch round the point where this projected through the stuff.Such a catch could be undone when the pin was to be with-drawn, and remain as a sort of loop to take the point againwhen it had been reinserted. A recognition of the elastic 1 De Mor. Germ., xvn, Tegumen omnibus sagum fibula aut, si desit,spina consertum. 250 FORMS OF THE FIBULA properties of hammered metal wire would suggest giving aspiral turn to the shank of the pin where it was doubled over,and this would secure a spring which would keep the catchalways pres

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