BROOCH

A fragment of cast copper alloy penannular brooch of Roman to Early Medieval date (100 to 700 AD), but likely from the 6^th to early 7^th century AD. The brooch is of Booth/Fowler Type G (Booth, 2014).

The brooch is fragmentary, missing the pin, one terminal and most of the frame. The frame survives as a curved segment ending in a break 20.4mm long, with a round cross section 4.6mm in diameter. The frame is decorated with a 6.3mm long section of transverse ribbing on its outer surface

The terminal has a flat cross section, tapering slightly from the outer to inner edge, decreasing in thickness from 4.3mm to 3.8mm. In plan the terminal is an irregular polygon with some faceted, some curved and some straight edges- in very broad terms it is a rough lozenge shape, but with expanded bevelled edges. The obverse and reverse faces formed by this complex shape are lozenges with the lower point cut off at an oblique angle. The obverse face of the terminal is decorated with punches- the design is unusual, consisting of a 5.3mm quatrefoil flower or equal arm cross with curved angles. There is a punched ring and dot at the tip of each arm/petal, the dot is off-centre in each ring and dot (suggesting the use of the same punch). The central quatrefoil is decorated inside with a central circular pellet and two further pellets in each petal/arm. The reverse face of the brooch is smooth and undecorated.

This brooch is firmly identifiable by its angular terminals as Booth/Fowler Type G, which have a long chronology dating from c.100AD right into the 8^th century, with deposition reaching a height between c.500-600AD. Type G brooches are found across Britain up to southern Scotland, but are particularly common in the northern West Country and around the Severn Estuary (Booth, 2014). The design of this brooch is standard but the punched decoration unusual- most similar in terms of decoration on the PAS database is NMGW-193AB5, which is decorated with a central large ring and dot punch with small ring and dots punched around it every 90°. Another brooch on the database with a variation on this “crossed ring and dots” design is SWYOR-50B036. Other Type G brooches on the database include YORYM-1967CD, IOW-4ECBF1, HESH-2086A7 YORYM-D6E554, SWYOR-6EA057, and SWYOR-0238E1

Length: 30.2mm Width: 11.7mm Thickness: 4.8mm

Weight: 4.75