MOUNT

Circular early Anglo-Saxon horse-harness mount with two zones of Style II decoration, dating to the first half of the seventh century; identified from the image only.

The material is uncertain, although the image appears to show gilding in very good condition with occasional spots of green corrosion showing through from underlying copper alloy. The mount appears complete if slightly bent, and the image is apparently at near life size, indicating a diameter of c. 65 mm.

There is a central circular setting with four similar but smaller settings evenly spaced around to form a ‘quincunx’ pattern. Three of the smaller settings retain a dome of white material, but have all apparently lost a central setting within this which would probably originally have been of garnet. White material can be made of various things such as shell or chalk.

The image from which this record has been made is slightly fuzzy and the mount has some soil and apparent iron corrosion adhering. Even so, considerable detail can be made out. The settings have single beaded collars; around the central setting is an inner zone of animal decoration surrounded by a ridged line. There appear here to be three interlacing Style II animals, made up of triple strands. An outer zone of animal decoration is interrupted by the four smaller settings; each of the four panels thus formed is filled by one or two triple-strand Style II animals. If there are two, they interlink with their pair and then have large and very stylised heads (no headframes are visible) whose jaws bite their own tails. A three-toed foot is visible against the rim of the brooch to either side of each of the outer settings. The rim, around the edge of the brooch, appears to have short panels of beading perhaps interrupted by lengths of a plain ridged border. There is no image of the reverse.

Mounts of this type are often known simply as Allington Hill-type mounts, because before the discovery of the horse-harness in Sutton Hoo Mound 17, their function was unknown. The Mound 17 mount was on the brow-band of a bridle, and it is possible that all of these mounts were originally on bridles. Fern’s study of early Anglo-Saxon equestrian equipment (Fern 2005) discusses circular bridle mounts (pages 53-57, figs. 5.6 and 5.15), with the Sutton Hoo example and the two from Allington Hill, as well as one from Spelsbury in Oxfordshire. The PAS database has another, from Creslow in Buckinghamshire, and there are further examples from the early Anglo-Saxon cemeteries at Gilton in Kent and Standlake in Oxfordshire (MacGregor and Bolick 1993, nos. 47.2 and 47.4). This small corpus forms a continuum; there are large examples with two zones of animal decoration and four peripheral settings (such as at Allington Hill, Creslow and Ashdon), examples with two zones of animal decoration and no peripheral settings (such as at Sutton Hoo), then the inner zone of animal decoration shrinks to a band of simple plait (Spelsbury and the larger Standlake example) or twist (Gilton) before disappearing altogether (the smaller Standlake example). All are of gilded copper alloy.

The Spelsbury and Creslow mounts, as well as both mounts from Allington Hill, have secondary rivet holes, which are not apparent on the Ashdown mount. The apparent presence of iron corrosion on the front of the mount may possibly result from re-use (the Spelsbury mount may have been converted into a brooch) but this must remain very uncertain.