STRAP FITTING

A worn and corroded copper-alloy strap-fitting of medieval date. The artefact has a sub D-shaped frame with central internal projection from its outer edge. The incurved outer edge effectively consists of a pair of semicircles which converge in this projection which terminates in a slightly expanded knob. The front of the object is bevelled slightly both externally and internally on the front; the reverse is flat. Around the bar part of a sheet plate has been retained; since it is partial the artefact can be considered incomplete, although the frame is an intact component. The plate is folded widthways and survives to just over halfway along the bar. On the extant side the plate is recessed for the frame. The folds are connected by a rivet just beyond the attachment end and towards the corner where the plate is recessed. The lower part of the fold has a straight edge just beyond the rivet suggesting that it may only have been short, compared to the upper part of the plate which extends beyond the lower before having been lost to a ragged break. An engraved line executed in wriggle work on the front of the plate follows the external line of the frame's bar. At a point towards the centre further lines in wriggle work extend, at right angles and two at oblique angles, one each side. A further transverse line of wriggle work appears to intersect these last, but this is unclear as the plate has been broken at this point.

This object would seem to belong to an ill-defined group of strap fittings described by Whitehead (1996, 42-43) as clasps or strap tensioners; it would seem that their dating can be brought back to the 12th century. Few such fittings survive with plates; one of the most elaborate is recorded on this database as ESS-C60241, which also has a very short lower fold.