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Object Type
Museum number: 1899,0425.1
Description: Flat circular dish (a paten?); silver; with low foot-rim and moulded edge; in the centre is a cross with loops at the extremities within a wavy border of ivy leaves, all nielloed and enclosed within two gilt circles; on the bottom are five stamped marks, two circular, two arched and one cruciform.
Cultures/periods
Production date: 578-582
Production place: Made in: Constantinople
Findspot: Found/Acquired: Acheripoetos Monastery, monastery (near)
Materials: silver; niello; gold
Technique: nielloed; gilded; stamped
Dimensions: Diameter: 268 millimetres; Height: 35 millimetres; Weight: 1.17 kilograms
$Inscriptions
Curator's comments: See also 1848,0601.13 See also 1848,0601.1 See also 1899,0425.3 Found with 1899,0425.1-28 For a recent history of the excavation of the Treasure see: R Merrillees, 'The modern history of the first Lambousa treasure of Byzantine silverware from Cyprus,' Antiquaries Journal 89 (2009), 1-15.
Bibliographic references: Dalton 1901 / Catalogue of Early Christian Antiquities and Objects from the Christian East in the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities and Ethnography of the British Museum (397); Buckton 1994 / Byzantium: Treasures of Byzantine art and culture from British collections (96); Kiely 2011e / The ancient Kingdom of Lapethos (22); Kent & Painter 1977 / Wealth of the Roman World. Gold and Silver, AD 300-700 (174); Dodd 1961 / Byzantine Silver Stamps (28); Cormack & Vassilaki 2008 / Byzantium 330-1453 (44)
Location: On display (G41/dc14/sA)
Exhibition history: (has Mount) Exhibited: 2012-2013 11 Nov-25 Aug, USA, Art Institute of Chicago, Tradition Transformed: Late Roman and Early Byzantine Treasures from the British Museum 2011 22 Oct- 2012 5 Feb, Perth, Western Australian Museum, 'Extraordinary Stories' 2008-2009 25 Oct-22 Mar, London, Royal Academy of Arts, Byzantium 330-1453 AD
Condition: The rim is oxydised and near it two holes have been worn through the metal.
Subjects: leaf (ivy); cross
Associated names
Acquisition name
Acquisition date: 1899
Department: Britain, Europe and Prehistory
Registration number: 1899,0425.1
Conservation: Treatment: 06 Jan 2014; Treatment: 11 Nov 2008

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