https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/templates/general_wide/img/logo.png https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/ https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches.html https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/disc-brooch-58936.html Sun, 19 Oct 2025 11:47:01 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		A flat (now distorted) disc brooch of the late Anglo-Saxon period. It is decorated in the Scandinavian Borre style, with a repeating interlace design, which forms four knots around the brooch. There is a plain circular recess at the centre which holds a raised pellet. There are pellets within the knots; they also form a border around the outer edge of the brooch. The back of the brooch is plain, with a hinge lug and catchplate in situ.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/disc-brooch-fragment-58730.html Thu, 31 Jul 2025 12:54:09 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		A fragment (approximately 20 percent) of a Kentish silver 'keystone' brooch of the early Anglo-Saxon period. The fragment consists of an annular segment with one complete keystone setting and small parts of the adjoining 'chip-carved' motifs, decorated border and central cell. The trapezoidal keystone setting lacks the polished garnet it would originally have held, but retains the waffle-patterned gold foil on which the gem would have been set. The adjacent 'chip-carved' motifs are too incomplete for positive identification, but they are likely to be Salin Style I zoomorphs. The outer border is decorated with a zigzag pattern created by punching alternately orientated triangles. The triangular recesses thus formed would originally have been inlaid with niello. The central cell is now empty, but would also have been set with a gem. The back of the fragment retains part of the soldered catchplate. For a complete brooch of generally similar type, see PAS: KENT4837.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/cloisonne-disc-brooch-58654.html Wed, 11 Jun 2025 20:23:50 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		A cloisonné-enamelled disc brooch of the late 10th to 11th century AD. The brooch has a circular central collet surrounded by a lobed border decorated with four smaller circular collets and four bifurcated scroll motifs arranged alternately. The entire surface of the brooch was gilded and much of the gilt finish survives. The original enamel inlay, however, is almost entirely missing. The traces that do survive are near-white, but they are possibly decayed. (The dark-green patches are most likely copper-corrosion products rather than enamel.) The back of the brooch retains applied rectangular strips that form the bases of the missing pin lug and catchplate. Very similar brooches are recorded on the PAS database as SF-68E55B and SF-16D477. See also UKDFD 7750.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/bow-brooches/ansate-brooch-58596.html Fri, 25 Apr 2025 15:48:26 GMT Bow brooches  

Description:		An incomplete copper-alloy Ansate brooch of the Middle Anglo-Saxon period. Comprising the arched bow with faceted decoration at the corners, and the arms, both are present, but abraded, one of them severely. Decoration on the arms consists of a central ring and dot motif surrounded by five smaller ones. On the back of the brooch are the remains of the hinge lugs and catchplate, the pin is missing.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Bow brooches
Category:		Bow brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/s-shaped-brooch-58485.html Sat, 08 Mar 2025 10:21:19 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		An incomplete reverse-S-shaped brooch of Merovingian France. The surviving piece consists of approximately one half of the brooch, which, when complete, would have been symmetrical with an animal's duck-like head and neck at each end. The large eye of each animal-head was represented by a semi-precious red gemstone, most likely a garnet, set in a circular collet. The eye on the surviving part of the brooch remains intact. The head and neck of the animal are decorated overall with a design of moulded grooves, beaded ribs and triangles, possibly tooled. The back of the brooch retains a hinge-lug, now broken, for the pin. A brooch of generally similar form, but smaller, less elaborate and unjewelled, is recorded as PAS: FAHG-52BAA5. The PAS photograph of this brooch is shown above as Image 3 under the CC BY attribution licence, as it was not displaying correctly on the PAS database at the time of writing.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/bow-brooches/cruciform-brooch-58431.html Thu, 06 Feb 2025 19:23:13 GMT Bow brooches  

Description:		A cruciform brooch of the Anglo-Saxon period. The expanded headplate has a slightly trapezoidal-shaped raised central panel, decorated with a line of punched wrigglework along both vertical edges. The top and side knobs are integral to the casting, they are half-round with a deep flute on each one. The bow is short and highly arched, with a triangular facet at each corner. Under the bow are two flat outwardly projecting lappets, also bearing wrigglework decoration, below the lappets are lateral bands of beaded and ribbed decoration. The foot terminal is portrayed as a stylised zoomorphic animal head with protruding eyes, large flaring nostrils, and a flat expanded noseplate. On the back of the brooch are the iron encrusted remains of the pin lugs and the catchplate with curved return which sits behind the lappets, the pin, probably iron is missing.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Bow brooches
Category:		Bow brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/brooch-58303.html Sun, 27 Oct 2024 17:07:11 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		A flat disc brooch of the late Anglo-Saxon period. It is decorated in the Scandinavian Borre style, with a repeating interlace design, which forms four knots around the brooch. There is a plain circular recess at the centre, which may have been set with a glass stone. The back of the brooch is plain with the remains of the catchplate and an integral lug to accommodate the pin, now missing. Traces of what appear to be dark red enamel survive on the interlace design.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/bow-brooches/small-long-brooch-58217.html Tue, 17 Sep 2024 14:18:55 GMT Bow brooches  

Description:		An incomplete small-long brooch of the Anglo-Saxon period. The brooch has a rectangular head with a framed central panel, around the top and sides of which there is a wide decorated border. The decoration within the border consists of inner and outer lines of contiguous ring-and-dot motifs. The central panel is plain except for a line of small Y-shaped indentations around the periphery. The short bow is decorated with a large central ring-and-dot motif, which is flanked on each side by a deep flute. Below the bow, the brooch has a pair of semicircular lappets flanking a framed central panel. The lappets are each decorated with two ring-and-dot motifs, and the central panel with Y-shaped indentations around the periphery, as on the head. The brooch is broken just below the lappets, and the lower end is missing. On the back of the brooch there is a pair of hinge lugs behind the head, and a catch plate behind the lappets. The pin is missing and there is damage to the corners and edges of the head.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Bow brooches
Category:		Bow brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/plate-brooches/nummular-brooch-57996.html Thu, 09 May 2024 15:26:26 GMT Plate brooches  

Description:		A nummular lead disc brooch based on the small cross design found on the reverse of many Anglo-Saxon pennies from the tenth to the mid-eleventh century. The inscription appears to be a blundered attempt to copy the moneyer's name and mint from a genuine coin. The last two letters of the inscription appear to read 'ИO', which, along with the findspot, suggests the possibility that the copied coin was struck at Norwich - a mint-town from at least as early as the reign of Aethelstan (924-939). The back of the brooch retains a hinge-lug and catch-plate for the (missing) pin. See also PAS: NMS-FCC155.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Plate brooches
Category:		Plate brooches

]]> https://www.ukdfd.co.uk/artefact/early-medieval/brooches/bow-brooches/bow-brooch-57820.html Tue, 23 Jan 2024 15:55:36 GMT Bow brooches  

Description:		An incomplete but very unusual bow brooch of the Anglo-Saxon period. The surviving part consists of the head and bow only, so it is unclear whether the brooch was of small-long, radiate-headed or equal-armed type. The head is circular, but is itself unusual in that it is decorated only with three trefoil-shaped knobs at 9, 12 and 3 o'clock on the periphery, each with a small indentation in each lobe. It seems likely that the indentations originally held small glass gems, but none have survived. The back has double lugs for the pin, confirming that it is the head portion of the brooch, rather than the foot. The bow is of shallow D-shaped cross-section with four longitudinal ribs and three grooves. It would seem unlikely that the brooch is of the small-long type, as the heads of these are invariably rectangular or trefoil-shaped, whereas the head of the present brooch is fully circular with three trefoil knobs on the periphery. Some aspects of the brooch may be compared with the radiate-headed type of the 6th century, more specifically English copies of the classic continental type, which often have three peripheral knobs, rather than five. The ribbed bow is also of a style that is commonly found on this brooch type. Two arguments against the case for a radiate-headed brooch identification are the fully circular head and the lack of any surface decoration on it. Radiate-headed brooches, or at least the continental varieties, almost invariably have semi-circular heads, five knobs and elaborate decoration. The case for an equal-armed ('ansate' or handle-shaped) brooch identification is mainly the fully circular shape of the head and the fact that this is undecorated. If it is of this type, it would be a new sub-type under Rosie Weetch's Type II: Ansate brooches with disc-shaped terminals (see References below), as none of the present sub-types have peripheral knobs. Efforts to trace a close parallel have been unsuccessful, but a Frankish equal-armed brooch ('ansate' type) in the Metropolitan Museum of Art is worthy of note, as it has a circular (but decorated) head and foot, and three peripheral (but single) knobs with indentations for glass gems. It is arguably the closest brooch we have found to the present one. A radiate-headed brooch recorded on the PAS database (NMS-C5EBB3) is also similar in certain respects, but it has a rounded sub-triangular head with moulded decoration and three single peripheral knobs.
Category:		Early Medieval, Brooches, Bow brooches
Category:		Bow brooches

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