sword;
sword-sheath
- Museum number
- 1996,0604.1
- Description
-
Iron sword with pattern-welded blade, cocked-hat pommel and bronze upper and lower guards; remains of a wooded scabbard on the lower blade. The blade is bent about forty degrees from vertical about a third of the way down, this was done in antiquity; ritually "killed"?
- Production date
- 9thC
- Dimensions
-
Height: 8.20 centimetres (grip)
-
Length: 82.50 centimetres
-
Width: 43.60 centimetres (blade top)
-
Width: 8.70 centimetres (lower guard)
- Curator's comments
-
Published:
Naylor, J., 2015. The Deposition and Hoarding of Non-Precious Metals in Early Medieval England. In: Naylor, J. and Bland, R. (eds), Hoarding and the Deposition of Metalwork from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century: A British Perspective (Oxford: Archaeopress), pp. 125-46 at pp.130, 141 (cat. no. 69)
Booth, P., Dodd, A., Robinson, M., and Smith, A. 2007. The Thames Through Time: The Archaeology of the Gravel Terraces of the Upper and Middle Thames - The Early Historical Period AD 1-1000. Thames Valley Landscapes Monograph No. 27 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford), pp. 232-3
Wilson, D. 1965. Some Neglected Late Anglo-Saxon Swords. Medieval Archaeology 9, pp. 32-54, at p. 52 (Appendix A)
-
A good example of a mid-Saxon sword with its fittings, Petersen Type L, similar to the Gilling and Hurbuck swords. According to the conservation report it was bent before loss, presumably in its scabbard. Radiography in the Lab shows the blade pattern. It was excavated in 1987 underwater by dragline in a gravel pit in alluvian Thames gravel along with two Iron Age swords now PRB 1995,0704.1 and 2.
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
- fair, conserved in 1989 by Dept. Conservation. The iron has corroded to show the structure of the blade.
- Acquisition date
- 1996
- Acquisition notes
- Originally conserved in the British Museum with two Iron Age swords found at the same time for Tarmac; after an interval of some years stored in P.&R.B. the company agreed to donate the group.
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1996,0604.1