File:Also found in association with the bracteate was a broken curved sheet of guilded copper alloy with similar decoration. - (FindID 275539).jpg

English: The pendant is made of a disc of gold sheet that is scratched and heavily bent in several places. Underneath the now missing loop a triangle is formed by beaded gold wire that is framed by spirals made of thinner beaded wires. Inside the triangle are undecorated gold strips that may have framed a now lost decorative stone. The loop has been cut off. The centre is decorated with the design of an anthropomorphic head with bust in contour lines. In the tradition of the imperial bust on late Roman coins and medallions that served as model the head is shown in profile, the hairstyle is decorated with a diadem, the coat is shown with two brooches and stylized folds, and an inscription in Roman capital letters encircles the head. In front of the face is an undulating line that splits into two in the lower third. Four circular zones with stamps alternating between triangles and spirals are surrounding the central image. Along the edge of the flan are incisions imitating a beaded framing wire.

Two curved copper-alloy fragments, of arched cross-section and each broken in antiquity, at both ends. The fragments fit together at their wider end and show extensive remains of gilding both on the outsides and insides. The outside was further decorated by groups of incised transverse lines and arched, round and triangular punch marks.

The function of the fragments is unclear. They fit together perfectly at their thicker ends, providing a curved outline. The sharp inner edges on the hollow undersides are curved inwards too far to allow a use as edging or binding, for example from a vessel or scabbard.

Their jagged edges may imply that they originally formed a completely or nearly closed, hollow tube, part of which has now corroded away (cf. Wührer 2000, Abb. 22.2 and 35.2). Should this very tentative identification be correct, and if the flat end on one of the fragments had been bent outwards, it is imaginable that the fragments were part of an armring.

While this suggestion can only be tentative at best, the projected diameter would have been approximately of the right size. However, Migration-period armrings rarely have flat segments and the presence of traces of gilding on the inside of the tube, not just the outside cannot be explained by this hypothesis.

A date in the late 5th or 6th centuries on the basis of the punch decoration on the object is likely. The Treasure receipt gives no further information about the relationship between the findspots of the gold bracteate and the present fragments; from an artefactual point of view, there is nothing to suggest that these finds were associated with each other.

Most Anglo-Saxon bracteate finds are so-called D-pendants showing an interlaced animal (see for example, Marzinzik & Behr 2008). The find from Near Holt is only the fifth A-bracteate (defined as a pendant with an anthropomorphic head in profile) from Anglo-Saxon England. Whereas the find and its iconography have close links with Scandinavian bracteates, it was most probably made in England as it is possible to tell from some technical idiosyncrasies, like the absence of a framing wire. The find was made in northern Norfolk where within a range of some 10 kilometers already three gold bracteates and a bronze disk with a bracteate motif had been discovered (Ashley & Ager 2006; Penn & Gannon 2005; Behr 2010).

The gold bracteate has been acquired by Norfolk museum services whilst the copper alloy fragments have been disclaimed as Treasure on 06/09/10 and returned to the finder.

Ashley, S J and Ager, B 2006, 'Holt area, Norfolk: Anglo-Saxon gold bracteate (2004T297)', TAR 2004, 79.

Behr, C 2010, 'New Bracteate Finds from early Anglo-Saxon England', Medieval Archaeology 54.

Marzinzik, S and Behr, C 2008, 'Northbourne, Kent: Anglo-Saxon gold bracteate (2005T352)', TAR 2005/6, 91.

Penn, K and Gannon, A 2005, 'North Norfolk: early medieval gold bracteate', TAR 2003, 69.

Wührer B., Merowingerzeitlicher Armschmuck aus Metall. Europe médiévale 2 (Montagnac 2000).