BRACTEATE

Early Medieval gold A-bracteate, 34mm long, 28mm wide and 1mm thick with a weight of 3.59 grams.

The bracteate is incompletely preserved, the loop has been ripped off and about one third of the stamped outer zone on the upper right part is missing. The gold foil is heavily buckled with several tears. The lower right part has been folded which may have been intentional whilst the other damages appear to be post-depositional. The gold foil was surrounded with a beaded wire set along the edge. It is heavily abraded. Underneath the (missing) loop is a beaded gold wire attachment (but with smaller beads than the framing wire) in the shape of a not quite symmetrical spiral. The spiral was soldered on the stamped outer zone of the pendant.

Wire applied underneath the loop is quite rare on bracteates, but have been observed on several finds from England, including two D-bracteates from Kent (IK 582 Dover Buckland grave 250 and IK 554 unknown provenance), two A-bracteates from St Giles' Field, Oxfordshire (IK 323) and Undley, Suffolk (IK 374) and three bracteates from the Binham hoard (IK 604,2, 630,1 and 630,3) (2011T657, 2009T657 and 2013T628) (Behr 2010; Behr and Pestell 2014).

This bracteate has a die-identical central image to the bracteate from Scalford LEIC-EDD980 (IK 635,1) but the new pendant is larger, and has an outer zone that is separated by two concentric lines and is decorated with a type of stamp not yet observed on any bracteate. It is round and formed of a central dot surrounded by radially arranged squares that are serrated and an outer ring of triangles and squares of which not all are well visible.

On the reverse a faint negative of the central image is visible. The surface of the reverse is partly quite 'pockmarked'.

The central image shows in the succession of the imperial head on Roman coins a male head in profile with a bust dressed in the imperial coat shown with stylised folds and three lines ending in semi-circular features, probably indicating pendilia. The hair is shown in vertical strands divided with two lines of dots indicating the imperial diadem ending in a central jewel in front of the forehead. Underneath the ear a dot indicates the hole of the compasses used for the die. The most unusual and so far unique feature of this bracteate design is the conical object with three horizontal lines that the man holds in his hand in front of his mouth and that may be best explained as glass drinking vessel (Behr 2011).

Surrounding the head is a series of shapes that imitate letters of the Latin inscriptions on Roman coins and medallions.

Approximate diameter: c. 36 mm; weight (before cleaning) 3.6 g.

Discussion: The pendant contributes to the still small number of gold bracteates from Leicestershire and Rutland. Its unusual design features suggest that they were locally designed and made, but following the Scandinavian/Continental tradition.