The Portable Antiquities Scheme

Groats of Edward I were treated as curiosities and mounted as brooches, often gilded on the reverse, the principal design feature of which is a cross. The addition of collets for the mounting of precious or semi-precious stones, etc, is more unusual, but is directly paralleled by a contemporary penny of Edward I (c.1282-9), converted into a pendant with gilt reverse and five added collets, found at New Romney, Kent, in 2000 (Treasure Annual Report 2000, p.81, no. 151). Gothic disc brooches range in sumptuousness and size. One of the most magnificent, dated to the first decades of the 14th century, is the gold brooch from the river Motala, Sweden, set with sapphires and small pearls, and rubies (Lightbown 1992, 145). The brooch was worn by means of a large, long vertical pin, originally fitted into a hasp at the bottom (and distinguishing it from a morse or mantle clasp). The stones radiate from a central cabochon setting; a central collet also exists on the new find. At the other end of the scale, disc brooches with non-figurative designs cast in lead-tin alloy with integral pins are known from London, where they re-emerge during the early 14th century in one piece form, bearing designs similar to those found on coins and tokens (disc brooches are known from the late 11th century; Egan and Pritchard 1991, 261). Coins converted into annular brooches include one in the Pritzwalker silver hoard, made from a gros tournois of Philip VI (from 1329-50) (Krabath and Lambacher 2006, p74 no. 35), and one from the early sixteenth-century Ducker hoard, Gotland (GW/LW/JFD 1997, 370). Examples from Britain and Ireland have been found in Co Meath (Deevy 1998, 109 no. RB 80), Penllyn, Vale of Glamorgan (on a groat of Henry VI of England struck around 1427-34; National Museum Wales Treasure Case no. 07.14) and Covenham, Lincolnshire (on a 'Short Cross' penny of around 1205-9; Treasure Annual Report 2007, forthcoming). Coins converted to brooches with pins as small disc brooches include a mid-11th century silver penny of William I (1066-1087) from Aldeburgh, Suffolk (Treasure Annual Report 2003, no. 78), a gilded silver penny of Henry II (1154-89) from Vernhams Dean, Hampshire (Treasure Annual Report 2005-6, no. 315), a gros tournois of Louis IX of France (minted 1266-1270) from Meonstoke, Hampshire (Treasure Annual Report 2001, no. 89) and a gros tournois of Henri VII of Luxembourg, 1288-1309 from Wickmere, Norfolk (Treasure Annual Report 2003, no.161). The Tenby find provides an interesting elaboration of this brooch form.