SPEARHEAD

An incomplete Middle Bronze Age side-looped spearhead dating from to c. 1550-1400 cal BC. Only the socket and side loops survive the blade being entirely missing to an old abraded break. 

The surviving fragment of the spearhead comprises a hollow cylinder copper that narrows down its length. It lowest point has its widest diameter (c.12.5mm diameter) and its upper end its narrowest (c.7.0mm diameter). Both these ends are broken the lower one being more irregular. Note that the upper break is the point from which the spear head would have extended. Two side loops project from either side of the socket. Each loop projects c.3.1mm from the side of the socket, is 10.6mm long, 2.8mm wide and creates a sub-oval loop c.4.3mm by 2.2mm..

The spearhead fragment is a medium green colour and quite abraded. Traces of a casting seam remaining along the length of one side of the spearhead, running contiguous with the side loop, while traces of one extend from the opposite side loop but are far more worn.

The fragment is 41.1mm long, 15.5mm wide, from the edge of one side loop to the other, the plate metal has a maximum thickness of 1.2mm. The fragment weighs 10.12 grams.

Side-looped spearheads are Greenwell and Brewis'  (1909) Class IV which they date to the early Middle Bronze Age. Davis (2012) has recently provided a more thorough typology of Bronze Age spearheads in Britain in which he dates side looped forms to The Acton Park Phase (1550-1400 cal BC) (Davis 2012: 108) with the suggestion that in some areas this use may be extended slightly into the Taunton Phase (Davis 2012: 108) (1400-1250 cal BC) their exact position in these periods being dependent on the form of the blade. This portion of the spear being missing a date of c. 1550 to 1400 cal BC is most appropriate (following Needham et al. 1997).