Early Anglo-Saxon Christian Reliquaries.

• Author: Gibson, Anthony.
• Place / Publishing House: Oxford : : Archaeopress,, 2022.; ©2022.
• Year of Publication: 2022
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (106 pages)

This volume presents a corpus and discussion of seventy-one Anglo-Saxon copper-alloy containers from forty-nine sites across England dating to the seventh and possibly eighth centuries, and variously described as work boxes, needle cases, amulet containers or Christian reliquaries.

Table of Contents

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright Information -- Contents -- List of Figures -- Figure 1. Type I Harford Farm reconstruction after Penn, K, 2000. -- Figure 2. Type I design principles -- Figure 3. Type I assembly features -- Figure 4. Type I and II techniques used for attaching lid top and body base (a) rivets, (b) flange and solder, (c) convex and solder, (d) material clenching -- Figure 5. Type I general arrangement when worn -- Figure 6. Aldborough (Yorkshire) unusual box with unfinished cruciform on body base -- Figure 7. Ascot-under-Wychwood (Oxfordshire) Type I base assembly with impressive Style II incised iconography -- Figure 8. Ashmolean Museum (Oxford) Type I, unprovenanced -- Figure 9. Dover Painted House (Kent) Type I after Philp 2003, base assembly with angled stop ridge, body decorated with chevron, cross saltire and diamond pattern -- Plate 1. Harford Farm (Norfolk) Type I after Penn 2000, reconstruction Tony Gibson and Peter Grey -- Plate 2. Hawnby (Yorkshire) Type I, reconstruction Tony Gibson -- Figure 10. Polhill (Kent) Grave 43 Type I after Philp 2003, with raised stop ridge. Lid ring and body repoussé decorated in curvaceous Salin Style II, lid top and body base with equal arm Latin cross -- Figure 11. Verulamium (Hertfordshire) Grave 21 Type I after Ager 1989, artistically decorated suggestive of Style II -- Figure 12. Wolverton (Buckinghamshire) Grave 2168 after PAS BUC-337D72, Type I with runes and hinged lid -- Figure 13. North Leigh (Oxfordshire) Type II with repoussé body and incised lid top decorations -- Figure 14. Suspension Flange Type II [a] Stanlow [b] Dover Buckland Grave 102 [c] Sibertswold Grave 80 [d] North Leigh [e] Burwell Grave 42 [f] Cuxton Grave 306 (iconography exaggerated) [g] St Mary's Stadium Grave 4202.

Figure 15. Burwell (Cambridgeshire) Grave 42 [a] Type II most highly decorated of all Types of boxes [b] lid top and body base decorated with die stamped reconstruction of the Beowulf Dragon Fight? -- Figure 16. Burwell Village (Suffolk) Incomplete Type II decorative flange -- Figure 17a. Cuxton (Kent) Grave 306 Type II after Blackmore et al. Incised iconography on hill very faintly scratched on original , exaggerated for illustration -- Figure 17b. Cuxton (Kent) Grave 306 Type II after Blackmore et al. Incised iconography on hill very faintly scratched on original , exaggerated for illustration -- Plate 3. Dover Buckland Grave 107 Type II after Evison 1987 -- Figure 18. North Leigh (Oxfordshire) Type II, lid top with incised decoration, body block type repoussé similar to that on a Type I box from Verulamium (Hertfordshire) Grave 21 -- Figure 19. North Leigh (Oxfordshire) Type II, proposed construction sequence 1. Size and cut metal blanks 2. Decorate body with repoussé 3. Shape blanks around a core former, possibly a tree branch 4-5 Drill holes, apply rivets, shape trefoil flange and l -- Plate 4. Stand Low, Derbyshire, reconstruction by Peter Grey after a watercolour painting by L. Jewitt -- Figure 20. Cuxton (Kent) Grave 306 Type III after Blackmore et al 2006, with incised secondary Gospel scene -- Figure 21. Harford Farm(Norfolk) Grave 18 Type III after Penn 2000 -- Figure 22. Marina Drive (Bedfordshire) Grave E3 lid top or body base, solder on underside, reused as a pendant -- Figure 23. Examples of cruciform decorations [a] Polhill Grave 23, [b] Kingston Down Grave 96, [c] Marina Drive Grave E3, [d] Uncleby Grave 1, [e] Sibertswold Grave 60, [f] Ashmolean Museum, [g] Garton Green II Barrow 6, Grave 4a, [h] Uncleby Grave 29.

Figure 24. [a] Illustration of design concept: cross saltire and diamond pattern [b] Pottery examples after Myres, J 1977 Bagginton (Warwickshire), Chamberlain's Barn (Bedfordshire), Chevron example Sancton (Yorkshire). [c] Dover Painted House body decora -- Plate 5. Bronze figurine 9cm height, Imst, Austria -- Plate 6. Centre piece bronze diadem, Late Iron Age, Vergina, Greece -- List of Tables -- Table 1. Corpus of boxes by county and box Type -- Table 2. Boxes by Type, box components (C) box fragments (F) -- Table 3. Boxes with cruciform decorations and contents -- Table 4. Known position of boxes in graves -- Abstract -- Introduction -- Archaeological and Scientific Dating Evidence -- Tables -- Artefact Distribution Map -- Technical Details Type I -- Design and Manufacturing Techniques I -- Corpus of Type I boxes -- Aldborough, Yorkshire -- Arncliffe, Carr Farm, Yorkshire -- Ascot-under-Wychwood, Oxfordshire -- Ashmolean Museum, Oxford -- Bidford-on- Avon, Warwickshire -- Bulford, Wiltshire -- Burwell, Cambridgeshire -- Castledyke South, Barton-on-Humber, Lincolnshire -- Cransley, Northamptonshire -- Didcot Power Station, Oxfordshire -- Dover Painted House, Kent -- Finglesham, Kent -- Garton Green Lane II, Yorkshire -- Harford Farm, Caistor St. Edmunds, Norfolk -- Hawnby, Yorkshire -- Hurdlow, Derbyshire -- Isle of Thanet, Kent -- Kempston, Bedfordshire -- Kingston Down, Kent -- Lechlade, Butler's Field, Gloucestershire -- Marina Drive, Dunstable, Bedfordshire -- Painsthorpe Wold, Yorkshire -- Polhill, Dunton Green, Kent -- Standlake, Oxfordshire -- Tidworth, Wiltshire -- Uncleby, Yorkshire -- Updown, Eastry, Kent -- Verulamium, King Harry Lane, Hertfordshire -- Westfield Farm, Ely, Cambridgeshire -- Wolverton, Buckinghamshire -- Yatesbury, Cherhill, Wiltshire -- Design and Manufacturing Techniques II -- Technical Details Type II.

Corpus of Type II boxes -- Burwell, Cambridgeshire -- Burwell Village, Suffolk -- Cuxton, Kent -- Dover, Buckland, Kent -- North Leigh, Oxfordshire -- Sibertswold, Kent -- St Mary's Stadium, Southampton, Hampshire -- Stand Low, Derbyshire -- Design and Manufacturing Techniques III -- Technical Details Type III -- Corpus of Type III boxes -- Cuxton, Kent -- Harford Farm, Norfolk -- Kingston Down, Kent -- Little Wilbraham, Cambridgeshire -- Prittlewell, Essex -- Fragments and Component Parts -- Barrington A [Edix Hill],* Cambridgeshire -- Barrington B [Hooper's Field?],* Cambridgeshire -- Bourne End, Buckinghamshire. SMR 0117702004 -- Hambleton Moor female burial, Yorkshire. PRN MCA 3633 -- Haslingfield, Cambridgeshire -- Marina Drive, Bedfordshire. -- Caerwent, Monmouthshire. PAS WAW-FF3CCA7 -- Ilam, Staffordshire. PAS WMIDS-DC4EA4 -- Kirton in Lindsey, Lincolnshire. PAS LIN-E32932 -- Stroud, Gloucestershire. PAS GLO-DA7D75 -- Wolfhamcote, Warwickshire. PAS WAW-DA3434 -- Secular Art or Sacred Symbols? -- Box Type I: Components and metal fragments of boxes -- Box Type II -- Box Type III -- What are they? -- Discussion: What are they? -- The final deposition of reliquaries -- Appendix : Children's Inhumation Grave Assemblages -- Didcot (Oxfordshire) Grave 12. Female, age c.3-5 years -- Marina Drive (Bedfordshire) Grave E2. Female, age 12 years -- Marina Drive (Bedfordshire) Grave E3. Female, age 8 years -- Updown Eastry (Kent) Grave 76:34. Burial of a very small child or baby -- Acknowledgements -- Illustrations -- Photographs -- Bibliography.