PENDANT

Description: Early Anglo-Saxon gold disc pendant made from a relatively thick back-plate onto which are soldered all the other components. In the centre is a collar formed from a vertical strip of sheet gold, retaining a shiny translucent orange/brown cabochon containing air bubbles, identified by Raman spectroscopy (see below) as glass. The collar is now cracked and has a lumpy appearance, possibly some gold solder acting as a repair.

Arranged around the setting are ten beaded-wire heart shapes, either touching each other or nearly so; the points touch the collar and the inward-spiralled ends touch a beaded-wire circular border. Around the outside of this border are 12 beaded-wire C-shaped motifs, each with the straight back of the C outwards and the double spiral ends towards the centre of the pendant; one similar single spiral fills the rest of the space. All of this beaded wire is of the same gauge, c. 0.3-0.5mm in diameter; it is worn or blurred, but in several places the beads appear to be oblique, perhaps imitating twisting. Perhaps it was made using a swage, sometimes held slightly obliquely. There are no seams on any of the beads.

Around the outside of the disc is a border formed from a pair of two-ply plain twisted wires arranged in opposite directions to form a herringbone pattern. The wire here is a little thicker than the beaded wire, at c. 0.5mm diameter. Outside this is a similar plain single wire, broken in places, then another single strip of plain twisted wire, probably two-ply but now too worn to be sure.

The backplate appears to have a projection c. 5mm wide onto the reverse of which a thin undecorated sheet suspension loop was soldered; the sides of this taper to a blunt trapezoidal end. Another fragment of this thin sheet is soldered to the front, overlying the plain twisted wire borders; this is not cut straight across, and seems a little clumsy. The reverse is undecorated; the whole pendant is now slightly bent and distorted.

Dimensions: Weight 2.7g. Diameter (excluding loop) 22mm. Maximum surviving width of loop 6mm.

Analysis: Non-destructive X-ray fluorescence analysis of the surface indicated a gold content of 60-63%, a silver content of approximately 35-37%, the remainder being copper (Department of Conservation and Scientific Research, The British Museum, File No. 7506-2, 17th January 2013).

Discussion: Gold disc pendants with filigree decoration are a well known if not common 7th-century artefact type. Although the details of the decoration vary considerably, there are several with two fields or registers of filigree motifs and a single central setting; from 'near Eye', Suffolk (2004T193; SF-B6EFA1), from grave 93 at Boss Hall, Suffolk (Scull 2009, 99-100, fig. 2.20, no. 93.14); and from grave 7 at Garton II (Garton Slack), East Yorkshire (Mortimer 1905, 248, fig. 638).

Date: Gold filigree-decorated disc pendants date to the second half of the 7th century AD (Geake 1997, 38).