Strap ends

Strap ends are anything designed to finish a flat strip of fabric or leather. They are made of copper alloy, one or both sides may be decorated. Generally there are 2 ends, terminal and attachment, and both need describing in detail. Also if there is a spacer, or any remains of attachments these need describing.

• Roman strap ends are generally lancet shaped, amphora shaped or tubular.
• Early Medieval strap ends have their own typology, which is too detailed to go into here.

Describe the design and decoration well and your FLO can assign it a type. Medieval strap ends take many different forms, again describe the components and method of construction as well as you can.

Example description

A complete Medieval copper alloy strap end. It is formed of one strip of folded copper alloy. The terminal end has a trefoil shaped protrusion at the end of a small rectangular shaft, and the attachment end is rectangular. There is a separate copper alloy rivet at the attachment end. On the front of the strap end is engraved linear decoration, 3 sets of 3 diagonal lines equally spaced. It is 30mm in length, 10mm wide and 6.8mm thick. It weighs 2g. It is in good condition. Similar strap ends can be seen in Egan and Pritchard 1991.

Example records

• Example record for a Medieval strap end
  PAS record number: SUSS-1E75A7
  Object type: Strap end
  Broadperiod: Medieval
  County of discovery: West Sussex
  Stable url: http://www.finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/397195
• Example record for a Roman amphora strap end
  PAS record number: SF-A3C877
  Object type: Strap end
  Broadperiod: Roman
  County of discovery: Suffolk
  Stable url: http://www.finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/394345
• Example record for an Early Medieval strap end
  PAS record number: SUR-8CA190
  Object type: Strap end
  Broadperiod: Early Medieval
  County of discovery: East Sussex
  Stable url: http://www.finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/394058