File:Anglo-Saxon gold bracteate (FindID 196357).jpg

7th-Century Anglo-Saxon Grave Finds (Treasure Annual Report 2007, no. 184).

Description of find

Gold Pendant
Decorated with filigree and granulation, and with four circular settings 4mm in diameter and a central setting of similar proportions. One red garnet survives and two small fragments of others were found in the grave fill.

The central setting is missing its garnet. It is surrounded by a ring of eight cells, four larger to top, bottom and sides, alternating with four smaller. Four retain their garnets. Each of the four smaller garnets is flanked on the outside by a long triangular cell which extends to meet the four peripheral circular settings. Two of these triangular cells retain their garnets. Two of the peripheral settings retain their garnets, which are much smaller than the cells; the space around must have been filled with a material (probably white shell or similar) now missing. Each of the peripheral circular garnets was set on a piece of stamped gold foil; under one of the missing garnets this is rectangular, and under the other the foil is missing. There are no surviving foils under the missing garnets of the central setting.

The gold backplate is decorated with a cross shape. The side and lower arms of the cross are made up of single lines of gold granules, each surrounded by a collar of fine beaded wire and set between long borders of fine beaded wire. The upper arm is similar but the borders flare to accommodate two and then three irregular rows of collared granules, and eventually to meet the sides of a wide suspension loop. A border of similar collared granules runs right round the edge of the pendant with the exception of a gap left across the top of the wider cross-arm at the base of the suspension loop. Around the outside of this is a rim of what appears to be twisted wire.

The areas between the cross arms and the peripheral circular settings are filled with panels of animal decoration in Salin's Style II. Animals with heads but no limbs are made from a single line of thicker but still finely beaded wire, flanked by a pair of narrower beaded wires. The heads have a single jaw, perhaps intended as a rudimentary hooked beak, and a pellet eye. All but two of the animals have the same interlace arrangement, with the spaces around filled with varying numbers and arrangements of collared granules. The final two flank the flared cross-arm, and here there is less space, so the interlace is simpler.

The suspension loop is divided vertically into three by two slight grooves. The reverse of the pendant is undecorated, but has a thin L-shaped strip of gold sheet in the area of the loop which possibly represents a repair.

Elements of Christian symbolism include several divisions into four fields to form a cross shape.

Gold Chain

A small fragment of gold from the chain that was associated with the pendant. This gold fragment of wire is folded so could be part of the chain from which the pendant was suspended or may have been part of a fastening device from a simpler textile string.

Gold beads

Two gold beads, one made from spiral wrapped beaded wire and one made from gold sheet formed into a tube and decorated with lines of gold wire. The former can be fairly closely dated, to the second half of the seventh century (Geake 1997, 43).

Glass Bead

A glass annular bead with a black background inlaid with a wavy pattern made from a twisted cable of thicker yellow and thinner dark green glass.

Ironwork

An assemblage of ironwork in very poor condition. This group is thought to represent part of a chatelaine or ladies key set worn suspended from the waist. It is not possible to be definite about the function until the items have been X-rayed by a conservator.

Pottery

A small sherd of coarse fired pottery, not necessarily diagnostic.

Discussion

The filigree-decorated disc pendant is a well known type in the south of England, with examples known from Harford Farm grave 18 (Norfolk), Boss Hall grave 93 (Suffolk), Sibertswold grave 172 (Kent) and Lechlade graves 84, 95 and 179 (Gloucestershire) (Geake 1997, 37-39 and fig. 4.4). A close parallel from Acklam Wold (East Yorkshire) is in the British Museum (acc. no. P&E 1871,12-7,1) and there are others from East Yorkshire, from the cemeteries at Uncleby and Garton II. Decoration in the form of a cross, or several crosses (potential Christian symbolism) is characteristic of these pendants, which date from the second half of the seventh century.

Conclusion

The group of objects found and recorded as treasure 2007 T498 are a group of personal possessions that would have been worn, presumably by a lady, in the mid to late seventh century AD. We can only say 'presumably', because no human bones survived in this or any of the graves at this cemetery. The objects themselves would have been rare in north-east England. The items in this grave are a small part of a larger cemetery that has been excavated and contained at least 109 individuals. Several of the other burials in the cemetery contained high-status items, all with parallels from Kent or the Continent. In this respect the person buried in grave 70 was one person in a community who had access to, and could buy from, some of the best craftsmen in the country at that time. At a time when Christianity was beginning to flourish nearby at Whitby some of the people at this cemetery were choosing to be lain to rest in a manner demonstrating a high degree of status.