Summary

Dragonesque brooch of bronze, with incised decoration, Romano-British, from Well, North Yorkshire

Accession Number

X.2009.1

Other references

Original description

X.2009.1 = X.FU 24. Unusual dragonesque brooch, lacking the lower head and pin tip. Marginal incised lines define the S-shaped field on the flat body. This contains a punched-dot design with a pattern of stippled and blank zones. The overall design is not entirely clear due to corrosion pitting; there are faintly-incised guide lines for the terminal fields, overlain in places by dots. The design has rotational symmetry, with the ends split longitudinally into curved triangles flanking a central circular motif. The point of each stippled triangle appears to meet the circle, round which blank areas flow to form trumpet-like motifs well-known in Celtic art. The central circle comprises two larger stippled quadrants and two smaller blank ones. This seems to be a variant ying-yang motif; the stippled areas can be interpreted as two opposed concave-convex lobes, separated by blank areas. At the lower end the field terminates in a point, but at the upper its line is continued to the snout, dividing the head in two. The head is an unusual form, apparently derived from back-to-back conjoined concave-convex trumpet pairs, with a knob terminal at the snout which has an incised marginal line. The tip of the curved oval-sectioned pin is lost; the other end is flattened and looped round the neck, with a slight central channel. Brooch L 48.5 mm, W 34 mm, T 3.5-4 mm. Pin L 29 mm, W 4.5 mm, D 2.2 x 2.7 mm. Alloy (from surface X-ray fluorescence): both brooch and pin were leaded bronze, with minor silver and antimony. Found in September 2004 by Alastair Hacket while metal-detecting; NGR SE 255 818. Portable Antiquities Scheme reference: YORYM-444291.

Associated person/people (e.g. excavator/former collection)

None

Discovery / field collection

Date of discovery

2004-09

Method (e.g. excavation)

Metal detector

Place (i.e. location of discovery)

Well, Yorkshire, England, Northern Europe

Grid reference

Not recorded

Acquisition

Acquisition date

2009-02-24

Acquisition source (i.e. name of donor)

Not recorded

Acquisition source role (e.g. donor)

Vendor

Image

None