Disc-on-bow brooch

Northern Germanic, 6th century AD
Found on the island of Gotland, Sweden

Female costume jewellery

This is a gilded copper-alloy disc-on-bow brooch, decorated with cloisonné garnets, discs of white paste, beaded wire and punched, geometric patterns. The foot-plate is flanked by two Style II bird heads. Some garnets are lost and finely patterned gold foils can be seen in one or two of the empty cloisonné cells. The gold foils would have reflected the light through the garnets.

A jewelled disc riveted to the top of the bow distinguishes this elaborate type of brooch and is a development of earlier bow brooches. The new style shows that Scandinavian craftsmen adopted the cloisonné technique, which was introduced through contacts with the Continent. Dies for impressing the patterned gold foils have recently been found in Denmark and Friesland, indicating the probable route along which the style spread.

Contemporary representations of women found on such items as repoussé gold foil plaques, show 'disc-on-bow' brooches worn horizontally at the neck to fasten a cloak. They probably indicated the high social status of their owners. Exceptionally large versions made later, in the sixth to eighth centuries, in Gotland and central Sweden may have been produced as cult objects.

H. Tait (ed.), Seven thousand years of jewell (London, The British Museum Press, 1986)