The Portable Antiquities Scheme

Cite record | Embed record | Print | | Report

Thirteen fragments of a sheet copper alloy vessel largest fragment length 287mm, width 67mm, thickness 0.7mm expand to 1mm at the rim. The group comprises of three wall fragments, one fragment of base, five repairs and four uncertain fragments. The vessel was constructed in two pieces to have a separate base. Steep sided walls with a rim that has been hammered down to produce a steep internal overhang, the separate base would have been mounted on a an angled lip at the base of the wall. Not enough of this lip remains to ascertain whether the base was secured in place by rivets, solder or pressure alone. The number of repairs suggests that this bowl may have been in use for a considerable time. In total there are six repairs, one is still attached to the base fragment. All are made form copper alloy sheet fragments and attached by copper alloy rivets. Vessels such as this are used from the Roman Period through to the Medieval Period, but the lack of distinguishing features on this example makes dating extremely problematic. However, similar repairs have been found on vessels from medieval contexts in London and also early Anglo-Saxon hanging bowls, an example found in Sleaford and dated to the fifth century had a very similar rim. Furthermore, the entire base had been repaired and replaced with a large circular patch in antiquity (Bruce-Mitford, 2005, 212) similar to this example. Hanging bowls are usually formed in one piece and a replacement base may explain the two-piece construction. However, there is no evidence for escutcheons in the remaining fragments. Therefore a tentative Early Anglo-Saxon date is suggested.

Bruce-Mitford R, 2005, A corpus of Late Celtic Hanging Bowls, Oxford University Press.

No references cited so far.

QR barcode

If you have a mobile phone equipped with QR recognition software, you can go directly to the webpage that this record resides at. Every record has an individual one of these.

Comment on this artefact's record

Audit data

Created: Friday 25th January 2008
Updated: Thursday 24th February 2011