corinne_mills/Treasure_act/
I’ve today come home from working away to find an email from Caroline Barton, Assistant Treasure Registrar at the British Museum part of which is as follows:
Just to inform you that Sonja Marzinzik has now completed her report on the fragment (with the aide of MS Leslie Webster) and as such I have passed the case to the coroner for her to hold the Treasure inquest. I’ve attached above a copy of the report; you’re copy of the letter to the coroner will arrive soon in the post but I thought I’d send you an copy via e-mail as your e-mail address was in the file.
The coroner should make contact with you concerning the inquest and once the coroner informs me of the inquest result I will then pass the case to the Department for Culture Media and Sport, who will deal with the case through the valuation process.
The report reads as follows
REPORT
Essex (2005 T298)
Finder: C. Mills
Date of discovery: 16/08/05 (reported to British Museum 13/09/05)
Circumstances of discovery: While searching with a metal-detector.
Object Date: Probably 9th century
Description: Runic gold fragment
An oblong, solid fragment of a larger object, roughly D-shaped in cross section and tapering in height towards one end. At the higher end, the fragment appears to have been chopped. The shorter end shows some damage and it seems that part of the underside has been cut away here.
The underside of the object is flat apart from a small dent and some minor ?cracks. The upper, curved, side is divided into two panels by a band running along the middle axis. It meets another band, that frames the lower edge of the object, at the narrower end.
The fragment is engraved on both sides with runes of the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet, or futhorc. Only three letters survive on each face: these may be transliterated respectively as (dots indicate where further letters are missing):
(a) …G D E
(b) T Æ A…
The runes are set in relief on a recessed background, which may originally have contained niello.
Discussion: It is not clear what object this very small and damaged fragment came from. Although the shape is superficially reminiscent of a seventh-century sword pommel, cut in half, such pommel fittings are hollow, not solid like this, and the fragment is also very small, and stylistically later in date.
It is not possible to make much sense from such truncated inscriptions, but two tentative interpretations may be offered. (a), which is probably the end of a word, from its form is likely to be the end of a verb in the third person, past tense. This could have thus been part of a formula, ‘X verb Y’, as in ‘X made’ or ‘owned Y’. (b) is probably the beginning of a word; D. Parsons, Institute for Name Studies, Nottingham University, has suggested that it might be a form of the Old English ‘teah’, meaning ‘tie’, ‘fastening’ or, secondarily, ‘box’, ‘case’, ‘casket’, ‘coffer’. It is possible but unprovable that this word might be the Y element, or part of it, in the formula suggested by the [unknown] verb on the other side. If the full inscription did follow such a formula, then it follows that an X element must have preceded the verb represented by its last three letters on side (a). This would have implications for the original scale of the object.
The small letters, cut in relief against a background possibly originally inlaid with niello, are typical of ninth-century Anglo-Saxon inscriptions, such as the Æthelwulf and ‘Lancashire’ rings and the piece is likely to date to that period. The fact that the fragment has been both struck and chopped up, perhaps for use as bullion, might suggest that this took place in a context of Viking activity in the later ninth or tenth century; xxxxxxx is on the edge of an area of Scandinavian settlement focussed on Colchester.
Scientific analysis has indicated a gold content of 91-93%, silver content of 5-7% and copper content of 1-2%. The small white specks on the back are osmium/iridium/ruthenium containing inclusions, indicating that the gold came from alluvial sources. An alluvial source for gold has been identified in at least one other ninth-century Anglo-Saxon object.
Dimensions: Maximum L 0.9cm; W 0.8cm; Maximum H 0.5 cm; Minimum H 0.2cm;m Weight 3.1 grams
Note: This find qualifies as Treasure under the Treasure Act of 1996 in that it is greater than 10% gold and more than 300 years old.
Leslie Webster
Keeper
Department of Prehistory and Europe
The British Museum
Sonja Marzinzik
Curator of Insular Early Medieval Collections
Department of Prehistory and Europe
The British Museum
