File:2013 T533 gold medieval fringer ring back (FindID 574298).jpg

English: Gold finger ring with red garnet inlay. The bezel is oval in plan (11mm x 13mm) and 4mm deep. The reverse is flat. The frame is soldered onto the bezel at 3 and 9 o'clock positions and starts at 5mm wide before narrowing to a thin, sub-circular in cross section frame. The wide section of the frame nearest the bezel is flattened with a triangular notch, possibly representing a heart shape. The frame is incomplete, broken after 2.5mm on one side and 21mm on the other. The frame is 1mm wide and mis-shapen at the break.

The thin gold bezel is folded over at the top to fix into place an oval red garnet. The garnet is domed and stands 2mm above the top of the bezel. There are no bubbles or features that would suggest this is anything other than geological gem stone, rather than glass.

In Medieval Jewellery In Europe 1100 to 1500, Marion Campbell states that '...by the mid-fourteenth century, ring wearing in Europe was so real a status symbol that attempts were made to regulate who might wear what metal...most commonly rings were worn on all fingers; and often on most of the joints of a single finger...this must have led to many losses, and it is probably no coincidence that rings are the most numerous of all medieval jewels to survive'. (page 72).