Anglo Saxon Graves

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Soldiers and Settlers in Britain)Fourth to Fifth CenturyBy S O N I A C H A D W I C K HA WKES

St. Hilda's College, Oxford

With a Catalogue of

Animal-Ornamented Buckles andRelated Belt-Fittings

By S. C. HA WKES and G. C. D U N N I N GIns/icc/or o f Ancicnt Monuments, Ministry o f Works

KDorchester-on-Thames in the ye:u 18 74 were discovered in the Dyke

Hills a number of burials belonging, it seems, to an as ye t only part iallye xp lo re d l at e Roman cemetery outside th e walls of th e Roman town.

Only two of th e burials were furnished with grave-goods, but these were of suchinterest an d importance as to be already well known before they received theirfirst full and detailed publication by t he la te E. T. Leeds and]oan Kirk in 1954.'The attention paid to these two graves by Anglo-Saxon archaeologists ha s

perhaps tended to obscure their real character as late Roman burials, an d theyhave been somewhat neglected by students of t he R om an o- Br it is h p er io d inconsequence. This is a pity, for these graves ar e in reality a rare and valuabledocument for th e history of events during th e end o f R om an rule in Britain.Among their grave-goods is a group of bronzes which represents on e of th e lastrecognizable phases of the art of th e Roman Empire in th e west, before its submergence under the Germanic invasions of th e fifth century.

On th e continent metalwork of this type and period ha s been the subject ofmany studies, as we shall see below, but in this country it ha s scarcely beennoticed. The neglect has arisen mainly ou t of t he f ragmen ta ry nature of thearchaeological evidence for th e late fourth and early fifth centuries in thiscountry. This, which may be largely th e result of the destruction of th e upperlevels of Romano-Bri t ish occupat ion in town and country by th e industrialand agricultural activities of the succeeding centur ies , and of failur e in morerecent t imes to locate and excavate late Roman cemeteries, ha s reduced the periodto th e status of a kind of no-man's-land between th e secure entrenchmentsof known Roman and unambiguous Saxon. On th e whole these problemriddled decades of transition p robably commend themselves m or e r ea di ly to

I K ir k a nd Leeds (I 954). Cf. also E. T. Leeds, The Archaeology o f the Anglo-Saxon Settlements ( I 9 I 3) .pp. 55-6. fig. H.



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FIG. 1

D YK E H IL LS . DORCHESTER, OXON.i\'os. 1-13. objec ts f rom the military burial (grave I ); nos. 1 4 - 1 6 , objects from th e woman 's buria l

(grave 2) . Pp . 1 If. SC. ';.Xftcr Ovoniensia, X\ ' I I -XVI I I , fig. 27, by courtesy



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N 3Anglo-Saxon archaeologists, who are already accustomed to interpreting history,without the aid of inscriptions or coherent coinage , f rom what students of th ethree previous centur ies call small finds. This may be wh y most of th e referencesto metalwork of the type here discussed have appeared in works by Anglo-Saxon

specialists. But t he v ol um e of comment is in an y case pathetically small,> andhas merely served to d em on st ra te h ow scattered an d ill-documented most ofth e material is, and ho w very l it tle is known about it in this country. No previouswriter has g iven any idea of th e quantity of these objects found in Britain, nor

of t he ir w id er significance w it hi n t he setting of th e late Roman Empire. We felt,therefore, that the time had come to bring together 3 corpus of some of this, th emost dis tinctive metalwork of the late- and sub-Roman and earliest AngloSaxon periods in Britain. I f such objects have anything of importance to add toour knowledge of this obscure epoch , it seemed that in this way they might bemade to disclose it.

We have not tried to assemble all the varied types of metal objects datingfrom this time, but have made a selection on the basis of th e Dorchester finds.These give us ou r starting point in an associated group of objects-i-two sorts ofbuckle, a strap-end, and various belt-attachments (FIG. I ) ~ w h o s einterest isconfirmed by numerous cont inental discoveries of similar sort. To th e typesrepresented at Dorchester we have added other kinds of buckles w hi ch b el on gto th e same style-phase. The seven main types selected form, with their sub-types,a natural group, at once numerous and distinctive. The volume of materialbrought to light by th e systematic scouring of publications and museum collectionshas proved unexpectedly large. The search ha s been a thorough one, and weare confident that no t much can have escaped our notice. I f anything ha s done

so, it is no t l ikely to change e it he r t he p at te rn o f distribution or th e basis of th eclassification. However much the ind iv idua l pieces vary in detail, they all fallinto a few c lear ly recognizable types. This has enabled th e catalogue to bepresented as a series of classified lists. For economy these have been set out intabular form, each piece with its provenience, present location, description, andsuch details of date and association as have been recorded. Most important, too,every object (bar o n e - t h e single case where permission to draw was refused)is illustrated.

The different types (see Catalogue , pp. 41 ff, for detailed descriptions of th evariants) ar e, for ease of reference, numbered as follows:

I )I I IIII J' Buckles with confronted animal-heads.

IV

V Strap-ends.VI Disc-attachments with suspension loops.VII Tubular-sided attachment-plates.

a Baldwin Brown (1915), IV , 551-561, pIs. cl-clv; Tonnochy an d Hawkes (1931); Bruce-Milford(1954); Evison (1955), pp . 29-3 1; Hildyard (1957), pp . 243 ff.: Cook (1958) , p. 73; Morris (1959), pp .102-3; Boon (1959), pp . 80- 83.



M E D I E V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

THE MILITARY GRAVE F R OM D OR C HE ST ER AND IT SCONTINENTAL BACKGROUND

The starting point for the corpus of bronze buckles and belt-fittings wasprovided by the two lat e Roman burials in the Dyke Hills at Dorchester. On e

of these must now lead us into the discussion.

a b

dFIG. 2

MI L TON-next-SITTINGBOURNE, KENTGroup of belt-fi tt ings of types v A, VI , VI I (pp. 4 If). Sc. l

Grave I (FIG. I, nos. I-I3) contained the skeleton of a man, furnished witha buckle (type III A, 2), by the shoulder; a strap-end (type v A, I); two disc-attachments ( type VI , 2-4), by the thighs; a tubular-sided attachment-plate (type VII,

I), found among the ribs together with a number of rectangular bronze plates;a bone toggle; and an iron knife (not preserved). A very similar group of objectsfrom Milton-next-Sittingbourne in Kent is preserved in Maidstone Museum (FIG.2 ) . Here we have a strap-end (type V A, 3) ; two disc-attachments (type VI , 5-6);



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N 5and two tubular-sided attachment-plates (type VII, 2-3), of which the identicallyflaky pat ina and fragile condition is an indication that they, too, were found in asingle grave.e A thi rd bur ia l of this type is suggested by the buckle ( type III A , 8),disc-attachments (type VI , 12- I 3) an d attachment-plate (type VII, 5), from an

unknown site in Kent (PL. 1).4 No other burials of this period with this kind ofequipment are known from this country.On the continent, on the o th er h an d, graves with this type of furniture

are relatively common in the late Roman cemeteries of the north of Gaul and

the Rhine land . Invariab ly these graves are the burials of men-and men, moreover, who were addit ionally equipped for death with one or more of the weaponsthey bore in life. The simi lar ity between the objects in these continental grave·groups and our ow n is most striking, an d it is worth describing a few of them byway of comparison:

Tournai, Belgium. Cimetiere du Parc, grave F.5Burial of man: with throwing axe; spear ; s tr ap -end (type v); disc-attachment(type VI); attachment-plate (type VII); and buckle.

Furfooz, near Namur, Belgium. Grave 3. 6

Burial of man: with pot tery, bronze , and glass vessels; spear; throwing-axe; knife;3 arrows; cross-bow brooch of developed type; buckle (type III A); chip-carvedstrap-end with marginal animals ( type v); belt-slide decorated with animal heads;IO disc-headed r ivets similar to type VI attachments; 2 attachment-plates (type VII) ;

bucket; and comb.

Vieuxville, nearLiege, Belgium

,7

Burial of m an: w it h p ot te ry and glass vessels; sword, sp ear ; ax e; 6 arrows; 3buckles (type III A), on e with chip-carved plate, and on e with very stylized animalheads; small buckle; strap-end (related to type V but wi th rounded end); belt-slide;5 disc-attachments (type VI); 3 chip-carved attachment-plates (type VII) ; pair ofscales; and 2 silver coins, of Constantine II I (407- I I ) and ]ovinus (411- I 3).

Vermand, Aisne, France. Chemin des Mortes cemetery, grave 284.8Burial of man: with bronze bowl; spear; throwing axe; knife; bone comb; buckletype III A) with stylized animal heads; s t rap-end of unusual form; 3 disc-attachm en ts (t ype VI); 2 attachment-plates (type VII), with several rectangular bronzeplates; and a n um be r o f studs and rivets.J No detai ls h av e b ee n recorded about the discovery of these objects , bu t the extensive brick-earth

digging around Sittingbourne in t he n in et ee nt h c en tu ry revealed Romano-British burials of all per iods .George Payne, Collectanea Cantiana (18 93 ), pp. 23 fr.; V.C.H. Kent, III , 96 fr.

4 Nothing is known about th e origin of these objects , but their preservation as a group very muchsuggests that they originally came from a g ra ve .

S Faider Feytmans (1951), p. 4.5. See also grave D an d grave 2 of t he s am e cemetery, which ar every similar.

6 Nenquin (1953), pp . 88-9, 54-7, e tc ., pis. vi, DIA-D, viii, D20. See also grave I.

7 Breuer an d Roosens (1957), pp. 243 ff., figs. 3 I -4.8 Ec k (1891), pp . 84-5, 252-8, pis. xii, 9-10, xvii, 1-20. See also graves 190 (pp. 49-5 0), an d 397 (pp,

104-5) with silver siliquae of Honorius (A.D. 395-423).



6 M E D IE V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

Monceau-Le-Neu], Aisne, France."Burial of man: with glass cup; silver spoon; sword; knife; razor; 2 buckles (typeIII A), one with chip-carved plate an d loop; strap-end (type v}, with chip-carvedo rn am en t a nd marginal animals; disc-attachment (type VI); attachment-plate(type VII) ; tubular object; cross-bow brooch of developed type; bone comb;whetstone.

lvfainz-Kostlzeim, Gcrmanv.t ' '

Burial of man: with sword; axe; buckle (type IV) with open-work decoration;matching strap-end, similar in form to that from Vieuxville; 2 disc-attachments(type VI); bronze neck-ring; tweezers; bead toggle.I t would be possible to list other graves of this general character, but these

six samples should serve our purpose i f we bear in mind that they are merelyrepresentatives of a larger group.

I t will be noticed at once that th e sets of metalwork f rom Dorchester, Mil ton ,and Kent repeat very closely th e assemblages in the French, Belgian and Germangraves. The lack of weapons and accessory vessels at Dorchester is t he o nl y factor

that distinguishes this grave from its cont inental counterpart s. But it is probablethat weapons actually were found with the burial. The grave was found duringth e levelling of part of th e D yk e Hills and there is a record of pieces of iron beingthrown away by the labourers. T he a pp ar en t lack of weapons, therefore, needno t disturb us unduly.

On the cont inen t these 'warrior ' graves w it h t he ir characteristic equipmenthave been the subject of much controversy, and to understand th e significanceof th e Dorchester burial it will be necessary to turn no w to north Gaul and th eR h in el an d. Tw o facts about these graves ar e generally accepted: (I) th e burialsin quest ion beg in in th e last h al f o f th e fourth century and e xt en d i nto t he earlyfifth; and (2) they a re the graves of soldiers in t he la te Roman army. The date is

established approximately by th e occurrence of coins in a number of th e gravegroups (see above, and below p. 18 f). The military character of th e burials isat tested primari ly by their weapons and secondly by their distr ibut ion along th emilitary frontier-zone of northern Gaul and th e Rhineland. Further, t he a tt ac hment-plate of type VI I with its a cc om pa ny in g m et al strips, may, as Leeds»suggested, hav e been th e fittings of th e protective leather apron which was anessential feature o f R om an mili tary armour. In the cont inen ta l graves th e m et alstrips sometimes occur, as at Vermand gr. 284, but very often th e tubulars ided p la tes ar e found alone, or in pairs. Werner» ha s re ce ntl y suggested thatthese type VI I pla te s were no t apron-fittings but ends for th e broad militarybelt. According to his theory, th e metal strips were used as sti ffeners for thesebelts. Whatever their function, th e type VI I plates ar e all very much alike, andwere certainly p art of th e uniform. The disc-attachments (type VI) are also verystandard in form and decoration an d th e Dorchester, Milton an d K en t examplesexactly p ar al le l i nn um e ra bl e c on ti ne nt al finds. They ar e best interpreted as

9 Pilloy, II I (1912), 99 ff., pI. iv, 1-12.r o Behrens (1919), pp . 3 ff., pI. 1,2.r r Kirk and Leeds (1954), p. 71, fig. 28.t z Werner (1958), pp . 379 If.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 7ornamental rivets designed, with their loop and ring, to ac t as points of suspension

for leather straps, presumably to li nk t he var ious belts and harness straps wornby a soldier when car ry ing weapons and other gear of war. We can thus bereasonably safe in assuming, with Leeds, that th e o cc up an t of grave I in th eDyke Hills belonged to some late Roman military detachment stationed atDorchester.

There is less agreement about th e origin of such burials, and the controversyaroused by them began far back in th e history of late Roman studies. The most

recent phase opened, in 1950, with an important paper by Werner on the warriorgraves of northern Gaul. In iU3 he suggested that th e deposition of arms andarmour with the dead, and various other features of these graves, such as th ewearing of brooches, and the placing of r ic h b ur ia ls among groups of poorlyfurnished ones, were Germanic customs. The warrior graves, therefore, were tobe attributed to the German laeti who, according to th e Notitia Dignitatum, weresettled in these parts of G aul. After the disastrous incursions of t he F ra nk s and

Alamanni, which had laid waste and depopulated the front ier districts of Gaul inth e third quarter of th e third c en tu ry, t he c ou nt er -m ea su re s of the em perorDioeletian and his successors provided not only for th e construction of a chain offorts along the Limes and the ins ta ll at ion of half-barbarian limitanei, w ith th eirfamilies, as permanent garrisons, but also for t he r epopul at ion of t he r av ag edla nd behind t he f ro nt ie r by colonies of land-hungry Franks, and Germans ofo th er t ri ba l groups. These received grants of land in return for t he hered it aryobligation of military service. The presence in north Gaul of these l ae t i - a

German word describing their semi-free social posit ion-is recorded in a number ofpanegyrics addressed to Roman emperors in the late third and e ar ly fo ur thcenturies, which men tion the ir dual role as farmers and soldiers and speak alsoof specific areas of settlement.i- Werner 's content ion is that by t he m id dl e of th efourth century some of these laeti had been enabled by virtue of their militaryimportance to attain the high rank and social status evidenced by some of th ewarrior graves. Already in 1891 Pilloy was attributing th e most famous of th ewarrior graves a t Ver ma nd IS to a Frankish chieftain holding high rank in th eRoman army. That there were many such by t he f ou rt h century is evident fromth e historical sources w hich record their important role in t he ma in tenance ofRoman military power in th e West. I 6 These German noblemen usually had th e

'3 'Werner (1950), pp . 23 ff.

q Panegyrici Latini, cd. A. Baehrens (191 I) , no. VIII, 21, to Constantius Chlorus: ' Just as by thydec is ion, 0 Maximian Augustus, t he F r an k is h laetus, immediately on b ei ng g r an t ed legal and peacefulstatus (A.D. 286), has brought i nt o c ul ti va ti on t he w as te -l yi ng c or n- la nd s of t he N er vi i an d t he Tre vc ri(of Trier), so no w through th y victories, i nv in ci bl e C a es a r C o ns ta n ti us , t he d es er te d a re as of t he l an ds ofth e Ambiani (of Amiens), Bellovaci (of Beauvais), Tricasses (of Troyes) and L in go ne s ( of L an gr es ) ar egrowing green again u n de r ba rb a ri an tillage.' (c. A.D. 293.)

ld., VI , 6, to Constantine th e Great: 'What am I to say, then, of t he t ri be s f ro m t he i nt er io r of th eterritory of t he F ra nk s, u pr oo te d, no t m e re ly f ro m those districts previously invaded by th e Romans,bu t from thei r own or ig ina l homelands an d from the remotes t shores of barbary, so that, settled I II desertedtracts of Gaul, they might main ta in t he p ea c e of th e Roman E m pi re b y t he ir agriculture, and he r victoriesby their military service (dilectu) ?'

'5 Pilloy, 1(1891),38-51 an d figs., pI. opp. p. 53. C f Ec k (1891), pp . 22-3,121-134, pI. ii.,6 Ammianus, iv, 10,8; xv, 5, 33, etc. Cf . .Juli ian (1926), pp . 84-8 ; Lot, Pfister an d Ganshof (194 0) ,

pp . 18- 23 .



8 MEDIEVAL A R C H A E O L O G Y

status of chieftains of tribal groups of foederati. The foederati held a positionsuperior to that of th e laeti in that t he y h el d land within the Roman frontiers bya foedus, or t re at y, w h ic h often confirmed t he t en ur e of land that had originallybeen taken by conquest. The federates k ep t t he ir na tio na l i den ti ty and theirfreedom, but their m il it ar y o bl ig at io ns s ee m to have become s imilar to those of

th e laeti. Breuer and Roosens have suggested that by t he m id dle of th e fourthcentury the dist inction betweenfoederati and laeti had become blurred, so that thewarrior graves, which make their appearance a t this time, may logically beattributed to either."?

We can now turn to th e conclusion of Werner' s a rgument . He stated that itwas th e burial customs of these German soldiers in th e Roman army w hi ch w er et he f ou n da ti on of similar Frankish customs w hic h c an be seen in cemeteries ofth e sixth and seventh centuries. The bases of Werner's thesis were rev iewed andcriticized by de Laet, D hondt and Nenquin!" who advanced the opinion,supported by much detailed and shrewd analysis, that th e so-called Germaniccharacteristics of th e warrior graves were no more than a military fashion commonalike to German and Gallo-Roman soldiers. They stressed the fact that by th emiddle of the fourth century th e exchange of ideas b et we en G a ll o- Ro m an sand Germ ans in th e racially-mixed northern regions of Gaul, in combinationw it h t he late Roman material cul ture enjoyed b y b ot h peoples, make it impossibleto identify German racial characteristics with any certainty. In other words, themajority of th e laeti and foederati ar e archaeologically ind is tingu ishab le f romthe Gallo -Romans.

However, there is an exception. This is t he c e me te ry at Furfooz, in th e valleyof th e Lesse, some miles south of Namur.xf Here, in a nd a ro un d th e bath-houseof th e Roman fortress on th e heights of Hauterecenne, were discovered 26

burials, an d of these t he e ig ht m al e interments were al l accompanied by weapons:axes, spears and arrows. One of these graves has been described above, a nd m anyof th e others contain similar equipment. Coins w er e o ri gi na ll y f ou nd in some ofth e graves, a nd , a lt ho ug h th e associations were not preserved, th e list, down toM ag nu s M ax im us (A.D. 383-8), suggests that th e burials, which seem to haveb eg un i n t he m id dl e of t he f ou rt h c en tu ry, continued until th e end of th a t century,if n ot later. The grave-groups, although not so rich as those from Verrnand andMonceau-Ie-Neuf, ar e very similar, and it is clear that th e Furfooz people had ana lmost iden t ica l material culture. The proportion of warrior graves, however,is higher than in th e other cemeteries and this as well as its situation on a Romanfortified site, emphasizes th e military character of this cemetery.

There are, in addition, various features of th e cemete ry which indicate thatth e Furfooz people were not Gallo-Romans, but Germans. Nenquin h as r ig ht lystressed that th e burial of th e dead among the hypocaust pillars of a perfectlyusable bath-house re flect s a barbarian attitude to th e amenities of civilization.There is also the old w om an in grave V who had been decapita ted before burial

q Breuer an d Roosens (1957), p. 294.'7a De Laet, Dhondt an d Nenquin (1952).,8 Nenquin (1953); Bequet (1877).



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N 9

and laid with her head between her knees-s-a custom that occurs later in Frankishand Anglo-Saxon cemeteries-presumably to prevent th e spirit of the agedc re at ur e, wh o may have been regarded as a witch, from walking after death.Finally, one local ly-made pot from the cemetery has German prototypes. These

indications must mean that th e Furfooz people were a group of Germanic laetisettled wi th their wives and children in or near th e fortress of Hauterecenne.They can p robably be identified with a section of th e command of th e praefectuslaetorum Actorum Epuso (Yvois-Carignan, near Sedan) Belgicae primae.i» part of

whose dut ies seems to have been to guard the roads to Trier. Furfooz is close tothe Bavai-Dinant-Arlon- Trier road.

Here, then, at Furfooz, we have a group of military settlers whose materialculture is almost indistinguishable from that displayed in graves at Vermandand other late Roman cemeteries in north Gaul, and wh o can be identified asGermans because they left behind them unmistakable traces of their racial customsand beliefs. That such customs survived at all is probably because th e Furfoozpeople remained a distinct racial group. At Vermand, Monceau-le-Neuf,Abbeville-Homblieres.>v and Vert-la-Cravelle,» on the other hand, t he war ri orgraves were in a proportion which suggests that t he mil it ary section was in theminority in these communit ies. Consequently, if these soldiers were origina llyGerman, it is only to be expected that c on tac t w it h t he n om in al ly Christiancivil population would have had th e effect of eliminating many of their barbariancharacteristics.

That in fact they were German is overwhelmingly probable, despi te allarguments to t he c on tr ar y, for reasons which we can now summarize briefly.We know that th e R om an army at th e end of th e fourth century recruited itsforces a lmos t ent irely from th e barbarian peoples along the frontiers of th eEmpire. We know that Germanic laeti andfoederati were settled in jus t the areasw he re t he warrior graves occur, and we know from Furfooz that th e burials ofsuch German soldiers take the form of these warrior graves. Therefore we ar esurely justified in concluding th at Wern er was correct when he said that th ewarrior graves were t he graves of Germans.

Confirmation of this is provided by th e burials at Dorchester-on- Thames.Close to th e m il it ar y gr ave was that of a woman , bur ied with a b uc kl e ( ty peIE , 5), and two brooches of nor th German origin: 2 2 a cruciform brooch and th ebackplate of an applied (komponierte) brooch (FIG. I , nos. 14-16). From a woman'sgrave on th e opposite side of Dorchester came a Roman key and bracelets,

two complete applied brooches and th e backplate of a third.vs All five broochesare, as Leeds has shown, unmistakable north German types, ancestors of th ebrooches that came to England with the Anglo-Saxon settlers in t he m id dl e ofth e fifth c en tu ry. T he se D or ch es te r examples are th e earliest examples of their

'9 Noiitia Dignitatum, pars occidcntis, chap. xlii.zo Pilley, I (1886), 177 ff.

z r Lantier (1948).z.a Kirk an d Leeds (1954), pp. 67-9. 72-3, fig. 27, 14-16.'3 Ibid., pp. 69-70, 73-4. figs. 29-30.



IO M E D IE V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

kind so fa r found in this country. The situation at Dorchester, therefore, is anextremely interesting one. Here ar e tw o women, evident ly immigrants from someregion o f nor th Germany, very probably Frisia, one of whom was buried near aman equipped in the charac te ri st ic fashion of th e laeti of north Gaul and th eRhineland. In th e original account of th e discovery th e man's s ke le to n w as

described as of 'enormous size', th e h ei gh t b ei ng later calculated at about 6 feet .T hi s c er ta in ly suggests that he too was a German;" one of a detachment ofGerman soldiers settled with their womenfolk in or near th e Roman town ofDorchester.o Moreover, they were evidently Germans from those 'remotestshores o f barba ry ' mentioned years earlier by th e panegyrist of Constantine. I4

That troops were recruited from so fa r north is not as surprising as might besupposed. The empire was desperately short of manpower, a nd n or th Germanydesperately overcrowded, so that th e landless younger sons of th e warlikenorthern races would find service in th e R om an arm y acceptable employmentfo r their f ight ing talents . In north Germany, in Frisia and Saxony, moreover,finds of buckles, strap-ends, and disc-at tachments-o show that some of thesesoldiers eventually returned to thei r homelands ; however, many left their bonesin th e soil of t he e mp ir e, as d id the people at Dorchester.

IMPORTED C O N TI NE N TA L M E TA LW O R K OF LATE ROMAN DATE:

BRONZE BUCKLES AND BELT-FITTINGS OF TYPES I I I A, IV, V A,

VI AND V II

Buckles of types II I A an d IV A and strap-ends of type V ar e of commono cc ur re nc e o n t he c on ti ne nt , and ar e often found buried together in sets of belt

ornaments. The finest examples h av e g eo me tric d ec ora ti on e xe cu te d in 'chipcarved' work, as well as the characteris tic animal heads. I t is these handsome andshowy pieces w hic h h av e received th e most attention from archaeologists andart-historians. In this country very few h av e b ee n found, and this is not th e placeto go into the details of their history, or to e xa mi ne t he full repertory of theirdesigns. I t would in an y case be impossible at present, in view of th e large numbersin western and central Europe and t he la ck of anything like a complete publ ishedcorpus of t he m. H ow ev er, there have been several selective studies, and fromthese we c an o bta in enough information to put our own finds in their propercontext. A long list of chip-carved metalwork was published with a bibliographysome thirty years ago,27 and this is still invaluable. Since that time t he re h av ebeen few major contributions to th e subject, except for th e important work by

24 Such skeletal statistics as we have from late Roman Britain show that th e population was slightlybuil t, un like the Germans , wh o were remarkable at this period for thei r he ight an d physique.

'5 There is e ver y reason to suppose that only a small part of th e Dorchester cemetery has beenexcavated, an d that further work there would uncover more burials.

26 Plettke (1921), pls, xiii, 18-2Ia, xv, 13-14, 20, 21 ane! 21a s ho wi ng e xa mp le s f ro m Borgstedt,Westerwanna, Hemmoor, Quelkhorn, Perlberg an d L an ge n ; R o ed er (1933), pI. vi, 4, from Galgenbergn r, Nesse; Tischler (1954), fig. 19, from Pritzien nr. Hagenow. See also th e m ap an d list of type V strapends in Werner (1958), pp 410 IT., fig. 15, an d his notes of warrior graves in north-west Germany, pp . 379 IT.

'7 Behrens (1930).



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N I I

Forssander-f and th e publication of th e Furfooz ccmetery. t f Most of th e Britishpieces ar c not highly decorated; on t he c on ti ne nt , too, those with chip-carvingseem to be outnumbered by less ornamental examples. Yet these humbler brothersof th e fine chip-carved buckles and strap-ends have been so much neglected there

that the ir numbers ar e difficult to estimate. What is clear, none th e less, is thatthey are c on te mp or ar y w it h t he chip-carved pieces, have th e same distr ibution,and ar e an integral part of the s ame style-phase.

The chip-carving style is classical in origin, as ar e its principal motives and

designs-the pelta, the palmette, th e rosette, an d th e vine-scroll. The use ofanimal-head terminals is also a late antique fashion. Some of th e type IV A

buckles ar e still very classical in style. The broken buckle-plate from Snodlandin K en t (PL. II , B ; type IV A, 2 ) , with its medallions and busts, is a good example,and there are very similar pieces from Rome itself and Hungary.>v But th egreat mass of the material, with its florid chip-carving and bizarre, stylized,animal figures, is already barbaric in feeling. The move away from classicalnaturalism towards a more abstract interpretation o f o rn am en t is quite pronounced. The vine-scroll frequently loses its foliate character and becomessimple spiral decoration, and th e marginal animals and terminal h ea ds b ec om eprogressively less naturalistic. The use of surface decoration as a whole becomesless res t ra ined-a t once cruder and more striking. The resultant style ha s generallybeen attributed to the influence of Germanic tastes in late Roman provincialart, and to explain this we must place the buckles and belt-fittings in theirhistorical and cultural setting.

Nearly all the chip-carved meta lwork is concentrated in a striking distribution along the frontiers of the late Roman Empire in the west (FIG. 3),3 0 from

Britain across Belgium a nd n or th France, up the Rhine from Cologne, then downth e Danube through Austria and Hunga ry, with outliers in Ita ly and Jugoslavia,and ending in a thin scatter on t he l ow er D an ub e in southern Roumania . Mostof this metalwork ha s been found on late Roman fortified sites, particularly atsuch centres as Cologne, Mainz, an d Tournai, and in t he ir adj acen t militarycemeteries. A great deal ha s also c om e f ro m the graves of th e laeti and federatesdiscussed above. The general context is thus a military one, and it is logical toconclude that this type of metalwork was produced primarily for th e use of thelate Roman army, more particularly for th e limitanei of the frontier forts, and th emilitary settlers, laeti and foederati, established in th e frontier zone. In time, ofcourse, th e style must have become fashionable among the civilians in theseregions, and so we find chip-carved belt-sets in women's graves at Furfooz an dat Enns (Lauriacum) in Austria,» an d in men's graves without weapons at Mainz 32

and Chevincourt (Oise);» There is l it tl e or nothing to show for it, however, inth e essentially non-military interior regions of Gaul. T his metalwork, in fact,

z S Forssander (1937).'9 Ricgl (1927), Eg. 86 ; Behrens (1930), fig. 8; Forssander (1937), fig. 19.JO Behrens (1930), fig. I ; brought up to date for n or th G au l by Faider-Feytmans (1951), pI. viii.J ' Werner (1930), p. 59.J ' Bonner]ah rb., ex LVII (1942), 249 ff.

JJ Bull. Soc. Hist. de Compiegne, VI I (1888), 273 ff.



12 M E D I E V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

represents late Roman ornamental style in a distinctive version, limited to th emilitary districts. And t he mi li tar y forces there, as we have seen above- thelimitanei, laeti andfoederati, and the res t -were virtually all Germans. The militarystyle owes its character, in fact, to the Germanic taste of these forces, and theirwomenfolk, who preferred R om an a rt in a Germanized interpretation. The chip-

FIG. 3D I S T R I B U T I O ~OF 'CHIP-CARVED' BELT-FITTINGS I N EU RO PE (p. I I)

carved buckles and belt-fitt ings, classical in origin but barbarian in feeling, areth e outward expression of that interpretation and that preference. Moreover,Germanic taste seems to have imposed itself even in high military circles, forthese florid chip-carved buckles, together with the ir cheaper and simpler counterparts, have all the appearances of being part of th e official mili tary uniform ofth e period. Such an idea is perfectly justifiable-indeed almost inescapable-inview of th e amazing standardization of form and style in this metalwork, whichsuggests that it mus t have been mass-produced by a highly organized and officialindustry. Objects which were obviously made in the same workshop can befound hundreds of miles apart along th e great length of the frontier. For example,th e buck le of type IV A from Sucidava in south Roumania, th e most easterly ofth e finds,> is one of a series with one-piece rectangular plates that is found everywhere along the frontier, and as fa r west as Smi thfield in London (PL. II, A; typeIV A, 3). Decorative details on the Sucidava buckle ar e repeated on other examples

34 Tudor (1945), fig. r a.




from Salona on th e Dalmatian coast,» and from Kreuznach, near th e Rhinebelow Mainz.w The ornament of the Smithfield buckle appears to have no exactcounterpart, but its coarse S-shaped scrolls are seen on a triangular plate, againfrom Enns,»> an d the dense arrangement of its ornament is reminiscent o f t ha t

on a set of belt-fittings from Houdan, on th e Seine, one of th e most southerly ofthe Gaulish pieces.sf The unusual design ofthe Richborough buckle (FIG. 2 I ; typeIV A, I ) , with its pair of crouching animals at th e top of th e plate, is paralled on abuckle from St. Polten in Austr ia .w and th e fine buckle from Kent (PL. I, type

III A, 8) also has interesting continental counterparts. There is a very similar pieceat Mainz-v which has the same double tongue and animal-ornamented crossbar, and th e same swastika-arm decoration on th e loop. A third buckle of exactlyth e same form was found at Herbergen, near Oldenburg in north-west Germany.«The fashion of placing animal heads or figures at either side of th e base of th etongue appears on ye t another group of buckles of type II I A , all obviously madein a single workshop. These are the famous buckle from Sedan in north France-sand its near-twin from Hungary.o together with a group of buckles and platesfrom th e cemeteries of Vermand« an d Misery.o They are made distinctive,indeed, by th e stylized engravings of animals that appear on their plates. Yet t heanimals that flank their tongues are almost ident ical with those on th e Mainz andHerbergen buckles, and it is tempting to think that t he s am e workshop producedboth groups.

Until th e whole corpus of this chip-carved metalwork from t he con ti nenthas been assembled and studied, it will no t be possible to guess at the number ofworkshops engaged in manufacturing it for th e Roman army. To locate them willbe even more difficult. Even if th e industry was so organized that workshops

in th e various headquarter towns and forts catered only for th e forces in theirimmediate area, th e transfers of me n and uni ts to d iffe ren t parts of th e frontierwill have scattered their products, obliterating an y regional grouping that theyma y originally have had . The retirement of ex-soldiers either to t he ir own homelands, or to lands granted them within th e frontiers, may have further contr ibutedto this dispersion. I f we look again at th e two groups of buckles, which we havediscussed immediately above, and if we decide from th e little nucleus of them innorth-west France that they were made in that region, then we must envisagesoldiers from n or th G au l being t ransferred as far away as H un ga ry o n th e on eside, and Britain on th e other.

35 Riegl (1927), pl. xvii, 6.3 6 Behrens (1930), fig. 3.31 Riegl (1927), pl. xx, I . This heavily stylized version of scrol l ornament was adopted also outside

the empire, at the beginning of the fifth century, on the equal-armed brooches of the S ax on s in north-westGermany.

3 8 c:. Roach Smith, GollectaneaAntiquo, IV , pl. xliii .39 "Verner (1930), fig. 35, 2.4 ' Baldwin Brown, IV (19 15), pl. cl, 3; Be hre ns (1930), fig. 4.4' Behrens (1930), pl. xxix, A; Forssander (1937), fig 23,2.4 ' Salin (1904), fig. 338; Forssander (1937), fig. 24, I .

43 Riegl (1927). pl. xxi i, 5; Forssander (1937), fig. 24, 2.44 Ec k (1891), pis. xv, r a, 2a an d 3a, xvi, 8, an d 9.45 Rigollot (1850), pp . 216 ff., pls, x an d x i; Wer ne r (1958), pls. 82-3.



M ED IE VA L A R CH A EO L OG Y

There ca n be little doub t tha t it was such t roop movements which introducedinto Britain not only th e chip-carved buckles from Kent (PL. I ; type II I A, 8) , Richborough, Snodland and Smithfield (PL. II , A ; type IV A, 3), but also most ofth e remaining buckles and belt-fittings of th e types discussed in this section. Feware of the high quality of th e four buckles just mentioned, except for th e buckleand belt-suite (PL. III; type IV A, 4), unprovenienced but almost certainly fromthis country, in th e Mayer collection at Liverpool Museum.av and th e bucklefrom Oxford (FIG. 2 0 , j; type II I A, 7), which is now very worn. In addition tothese there are a few pieces with inferior and less interesting chip-carved ornamentsuch as th e broken strap-ends from Richborough (FIG. 23, d and e; type V A, 4-5),and that from Leicester (FIG. '23, a; type V A, 2 ) , which, with its central scrollsand marginal animals, is reminiscent of th e much finer example from Furfooz.czThe strap-end from Ixworth (FIG. 23, g; type V A, 1 0 ) with its exceptionallyshallow chip-carved ornament is somewhat unusual in other respects too.Although its pelta-rosette is on e of th e variants that occurs with fair frequency

on the continental metalwork , its panel of cross-hatching is less easy to parallel.Such cross-hatching seems to have played only a subordinate role in th e cont inen ta l reper tory and examples of it are scattered. Bu t it undoubtedly was afavouri te form of decoration on our buckle-plates of type I (see below, p. 24), andthese were an insular development. The Ixwor th s t rap-end may therefore beeither an imported piece, or a British copy. Two other strap-ends also hold anambiguous place in th e corpus. These, th e stamp-decorated fragment from Richborough (FIG. 23, b; type V A, 6) and the densely-stamped example from Icklingham (FIG. 23, h; type V A, 9) with its worn margina l animals, have no exactparallels abroad. Were they also local copies of imported pieces? I t is difficult tobe certain. Stamped decoration of this type is common o n b ot h sides ofthe Channel

at this period, and on th e whole it is perhaps best to assume that these pieceswere made abroad, since we have no real evidence to th e contrary. The strapends which have no ornament or else ar e very simply bordered with lines of stampsar e certainly continental. We have only four of these: those from Dorchester (FIG.

r, no. I I ; type V A, I ) and Milton (FIG. 2 , a; type V A, 3), and two others fromAnglo-Saxon graves at Cassington (FIG. 23, j ; type V A, 7) and Croydon (FIG.

23, c; type v A, 8). Werner has recently made a list and distribution-map ofthose found on the continent, and shown that t hey a re numerous i n n or th France,Belgium, the Rhine land , and north Germany.sf

With the buckle f rom Catterick (FIG. 2 2 ; type IV B, I ) and th e buckles oftype II I A, we have no problems. The Catterick one has been discussed at somelength by Hildyard.w wh o cites sufficient paral le ls to' show that it belongs to adistinctive, if not numerous, continental class. Mostlikeit are buckles from Bingenon the Rh in e n ea r Mainz 50 and Krefe ld Gel lep near Cologne.» I t was clearly

4 6 Baldwin Brown, IV (1915), pI. el, 3.47 Nenquin (1953), pI. vi an d fig. 13, no. DIA.4 8 Werner (1958), pp . 410-11, fig. 15.49 Hildyard (1957), pp . 243 ff., pI. ix, fig. 6, 12.5° Ibid., fig. 6, 12, b; Kataloge Sudwest-deutscher arch. Sammlung, IV , pI. iii.5' Hildyard (1957) , fig. 6, 12C; Behrens (1930), pI. xxxi, 4.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N

made in t he s am e w or ks ho p as these , probably somewhere in th e R hi ne la nd . F o rth e closest counterparts o f o ur buckles of type II I A we must look to the cemeteriesof Belgium a nd n or th er n France. A t Ver ma nd , Aisne , we find a buckle with anarcaded and t oo le d l oo p v er y s im il ar to th e on e from Icklingham (FIG. 2 0 , d; typeII I A, 6) .5 2 The i r regular ly notched loop of th e Holbury buckle (FIG. 2 0 , c; II I A, 3) ,with its stylized animal-heads, is again very closely matched at Vcrrnand.se andthere is a somewhat similar example at Furfooz.s- Semi-circular plates like thaton t he D or ch es te r piece ar e less common on this class of buckle than those of

rectangular form, but t he re a re a few parallels, notably th e fine silver-gilt buckles,ornamented with niello and chip-carving, in th e warrior' s grave a t Vermand.se andanother decorat ive piece in a grave a t Abbeville-Homblieres, Aisne.so Presumablyth e Dorchester buckle is a cheaper version of s uc h ex otic p ro du ct s. The othertype II I A buckles from this country (FIG. 2 0 , a, b a n d e, type II I A, 1,4-5) have noplates. They have been found a t Richborough and Bradwell, both 'Saxon-Shore'forts. They a re u nd ec or at ed and their animal heads ar e stylized and flatlyrendered. There are several like them in the Belgian and north French cemeteries,and among these th e ones from Spontin-> and Molcnbeek-St.vjean.w both inBelgium, provide th e closest comparisons.

Sufficient ha s already been said about the disc-at tachments and attachmentplates to demonst rate thei r con tinen tal origin. Apart from those in t he tw o g rav esat Dorchester and Milton and those associa ted with th e buck le f rom Kent (PL. I;types VI , 12-13 and VII, 5), th e only finds from Britain are those from Richborough(FIG 24, C, d, g and h; types VI, 7-9, VII, 4) , Croydon (FIG. 24, e; type VI, ro),Croxton (FIG. 24, f ; type VI , I I ) , and Caistor-by-Norwich (FIG. 24, b: type VI, I ) .

The o nl y f ea tu re w o rt h f ur th er comment is th e simple running spiral decoration

on th e Milton attachment-plates. Borders of this design are, of course, a simplifiedlinear version of the ch ip-carved tendril-scroll pattern, of which one could citemany examples.as Incised running-spiral decoration comparable to that on th eMilton plates can be seen at this period at Verrnand.vv Monceau-Ie-Neuf.vTrier.v- and Frankfurt.es and at m any other sites. I t was a f av ou ri te f or m ofdecoration in th e late Roman Empire.

Here, then, we have several types of objects, of varying qual i ty, but almost al lof continental manufacture, which have been found on sites in Britain (FIG. 4)in on e certain and tw o possible late Roman military buria ls (Dorchester, Miltona nd K en t) ; on late Roman military sites (the 'Saxon-Shore' forts at Richborough

F Eck (l891), pl. xvi, 8.53 Ibid., grave 284, pp . 252 ff., pl. xvii, 4a.54 Nenquin (l95g), pI. vii, D6.55 Eck (1891), pl. ii , 2 an d 4.56 Pil loy, 1 (1886), pl. v.5i Dasnoy (1955), pI. i.;8 de Loe (1937), pp. 251-3.59 Ec k (1891), pl. ii , 5-6; Riegl (1927), pls. xvii, 4-6.60 Ec k (1891), pl. xv, ga.6, Pilloy, II I (1912), pl. iv, 4.6, Werner (1958) , pl. lxxx, 2.6J Behrens (1930), fig. 6.



16 M E D I E V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

IIIA riA IVI VA VI vn

fROid kOMAN 11m .. • • .. •Fml AN'LO l A ~ O HllHl c: 0

(HAH(f FINIS .. § A e

~" 0 10 ~ JO 40 50 .0 70 Mill!

.... ! ! I

0 10 30 50 70 Kill.

b W w W I

FIG. 4DISTRIBUTIO:'{ O F C ON TI NE l\ 'TAL METALWORK OF TYPES II I A, IV, V A, VI an d VI I

IN BRITAIN (pp. 15-17)




and Bradwell); in late levels of Roman towns (London, Leicester, Caistor-byNorwich and Cattcrick); in a Roman villa with late occupation (Holbury,Hants.); and as chance finds most ly in th e east of England (Snodland, Kent;Ixworth and Icklingham, Suffolk; Croxton in SW . Norfolk; and Oxford). The

two finds f rom Anglo-Saxon burials ar e almost certainly survivals from the latefourth or early fifth century. Most, if no t all, of these objects were made in workshops in Belgium, north France, and th e Rhineland for th e late Roman frontierforces and their Germanic allies.

The predominantly eastern distribution of our ow n material (FIG. 4) suggeststhat we ar e m ai nl y c on ce rn ed w it h th e forces of th e Comes Litoris Saxonici: th ea rm y cha rged with th e defence of t he e as te rn coast aga inst Saxon raiders, andbased on t he c ha in of 'Saxon-Shore' forts stretching from Brancaster in Norfolkto Porchester in Hampshire. Apart from t he na me s of th e garrisons recorded inth e British sections of th e Notitia Dignitatum, very l it tle is known about th e com

positionof

thisarmy

inlate Roman

times,nor

ismuch known about th e

fortsthemselves. Many of th e forts h av e b ee n damaged by coast erosion, or by laterAnglo-Saxon an d medieval building. I t is th e headquarters fort of Richborough,the only one that has been extensively excavated in modern times, which hasgiven us th e largest assemblage of late Roman mili tary metalwork. Very littlehas come to light from the other forts, and we must assume that their archaeologywas like that of Richborough. The pathetically small group of finds from Bradwellhints as much. The mili tary culture of Riehborough therefore should be regardedno t as a unique phenomenon, but as representative of that of th e 'Saxon Shore'as a whole.

The buckles and belt-fittings suggest that in th e command of th e Count of

th e S ax on S ho re in the late fourth century there were soldiers wh o had beenbrought over from the continent , an d wh o were probably of German stock. Thebronze objects are not the only testimony to this. A g ra ve , f ou nd by chanceoutside th e defences at Richborough , contained the skeleton of a man, with longsword, spear, shield and pewter bowl (FIG. 5, a-c). 64 Bushe-Fox called it th eburial of a Saxon raider, but no band of Saxon raiders would have buried oneof their number is such careful fashion within sight of a Roman fort. In an ycase, as we have seen above, this kind of equipment is typical of late Romanmilitary burials on t he c on ti ne nt . German he may well have been, but thiswarrior was cer ta in ly one of t he R ichborough g ar ri so n: o ne of th e defendersand not one of th e attackers. This apparently solitary burial is likely to be partof an as yet unexcavated cemetery of th e 'Saxon-Shore' fort. The presence ofother soldiers with similar equipment is attested by the finds, in ditch fillings andto p soil, of a shield boss (FIG. 5, d), throwing axes, and spears, identical with thoseof th e continental warrior graves. 6s That th e last defenders of t he 'Saxon Shore'inc luded many hal f -barbar ian troops like th e limitanei, by no w familiar, whosegraves and whose equipment c lus te r so thick ly around th e frontier towns and

64 Bushe Fox (1949), pI. lxii i, nos. 349-351 . The sword, which apparently had a horn-mounted hilt.was no t preserved or illustrated.

65 Ibid., pls, lxi ii, no. 352, lxi, nos. 341-2 , an d pI. lviii.



18 MEDIEVAL ARCHAEOLOGY

RICHBOROUGH, KE:'oIT

a-c, Spear-head, shield-boss an d pewter bowl, from a burial N. of'Saxon-shore' fort ; d, shield-boss from i nn e r d it eh of stone fort

(p. 17). Se. }

Ld

b

cI I

u

a

forts of north Gaul an d th eRhineland, is, as we shallsee, not in th e least surprising. More puzzlingperhaps is their presence ininland towns of th e civilzone, at London, Leicesterand Dorchester. This question we will leave forconsideration in th e nextsection.

When, more exactly, was all this takingplace? None of our material is closely datable.The best that the Richborough finds, or th eCattcrick buckle, can dois to indicate the latefourth or early fifth century in general. For moreprecise dating we mustreturn to t he co nt in en t,where some of th e warriorgraves, and contemporarygraves with similar metal

work, contained coins.A glance over th ewhole picture tells us atonce that the militarystyle of chip-carved andanimal-ornamented buckles and belt-fittings, andthe w e a p o n - e q u i p p e dgraves of which they ar eso characteristic a feature,b egin only in th e second

half of th e fourth century. The w om an 's g ra veat Enns in Austr ia , which

contained seven fine chip-carved belt-fittings.s- is dated after A.D. 360-3 by acoin of Julian th e Apostate. Two graves at Abbeville-Homblieres.vs whichcontained almost identical buckles of type III A , had coins, on e a corroded bronzeof either Cons tans (337-350) or Magnentius (350-3), th e other a silver siliqua

66 Graves 4 an d 67: ef. Pilloy, I (1886), 179-80, and 19 I -2 .



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 19

of Valentinian I (364-75). The famous warrior grave at Vermand, with its chipcarved silver buckles of type III A, was strongly suspeeted by Ec k 1 5 to havecontained a gold solidus of Arcadius (395-408). It was in an y case on e o f w ha tmu st h av e been a family groupo-all rieh bu ria ls wi th g old or silver coins, none

earlier than th e t hr ee w ome n' s graves with coins of Valentini an 1.6 7

Yet anothergrave a t Ver ma nd with a fine buckle of type II I A and plate of type V II containedtwo silver siliquae of Honorius (395-423).68 At Spont in , t he stylized loop of typeII I A, which we ha ve alrea dy noticed as a close parallel to t he R ic hb or ou gh

examples (p. 15), was buried with a gold solidus of Constantine II I (407- I I ) , andwe m us t n ot forget th e grave at Vieuxville (see above, p. 5 ), w he re an assemblageof buckles and fittings of th e types in question was buried together with coinsof Constantine III and Jovinus (411-13). At Furfooz, where no detailed coinassociations were preserved, th e coin-list for th e cemetery w en t d ow n to MagnusMaximus (383-8).69

Coins ar e admittedly deceptive. They may be preserved for many yearsbefore burial, or they ma y be buried almost at once. T he y can no t thereforebe relied on to give an exact dating. In this case what they and th e other gravegoods tell us is that the chip-carved and related metalwork cannot be dated much,if at all, before th e reign of Valentinian 1. We have seen that this metalworkseems to have been produced in official workshops as part of th e standard militaryuniform of th e frontier forces of th e we ster n e mpi re , and it is only logical toassume that at some point in time an official order was given to bring such astate of affairs into being. Now Valentinian was first and foremost a soldier,efficient and energetic when it came to military matters. He was chiefly concernedwith the frontier defences, and was the first emperor since Diocletian and

Maximian to under take new for t building, both on th e Rhine and in north Gaul.He also strengthened his forces by recruiting Franks into his armies . Did healso order th e adoption of this distinctive new mil it ary uniform-this metalworkwhich would not only have appealed to th e tastes of his German soldiery butby its standardization would also have given them a sense of esprit de corps? I t isan at tractive theory and on e that is no t improbable.

During th e first years of th e reign of Valentini an , f ro m 3 64 onwards, Bri tainbecame increasingly subject to a tt ac ks f ro m all qua rt er s aga in st her frontiers:a tt acks f rom Saxons, Picts and Scots. In 367 th e Roman armies in Britain weredefeated; th e Commander of th e Coastal Defences, th e so-called ' Saxon Shore ',was killed and th e G eneral of th e Field Army was routed. The province wasoverrun and pillaged. The news r ea ch ed Val en ti ni an w he n he was in northernGaul attending, as ever, to th e defences of th e frontier. In 368 he sent CountTheodosius across th e Channel with a large force to restore order in Britain.Theodosius found th e country full of r ai di ng b an ds of barbarians, and it wasn ot until 369 that he cou ld beg in to drive th em out and restore peace. Exceptthat the Wall in th e north was once more put in order and signal-stations were

6; Eek (1886) , pp. 23-6.68 Eek (1886), pp . 104-5, pI. xvi, 8-9.69 :\ 'enquin (1953), pp . 20-21.



2 0 M E D I E V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

built as a northward extension of th e 'Saxon-Shore' defences, we known verylittle about his measures . Bu t C. E. Stevens ha s made two very interestingsuggestions about th e manning of th e frontiers after 368,70 and these ar e ofimportance to us. The first was that the Wall was f rom this t ime garrisoned bylocal British militia and federates; th e second was that th e Milites Tungrecani(o f Tong res) and th e Numerus Turnacensium (o f Tournai), recorded by th e Notitiaas th e garrisons of the 'Saxon-Shore' forts of Dover and Lymne, were amongth e troops brought over by Theodosius. From t he ir na mes we can guess thatt he y w er e detachments which had been withdrawn from th e northern frontierof Gaul, that is t roops from th e very area which ha s produced so many of th ewarrior graves and so much of th e metalwork we have been discussing. Thereis every reason to accept Stevens's view, and no t only on documentary grounds.The crisis of 367 had found Valentinian in this very area of Gaul, an d in hurriedlyassembling an army to send to Britain he would natural ly have found it quickestto use t he n ea re st available forces. The situation in Britain in 369 is thus aninteresting one. On th e 'Saxon Shore' we have forces drafted in from northernGaul.:" whereas on the Wall we have only local British levies. This accordsperfect ly wel l with the distribution of our imported buckles and belt-fittings,which, as we have seen, are concent ra ted on or near the 'Saxo n Shore', andwhich do no t occur at all on th e Wall. We may, therefore, be justified in thinkingthat th e ch ip- ca rve d an d a ni ma l- or na me nt ed m il it ar y m et al wo rk was firstintroduced into Bri ta in from north Gaul by th e arm y of Theodosius in 368-9.

This was only a beginning, of course. As we can see from the continentalgraves, buckles of types II I A an d IV and belt-fittings of types V A, VI and VI I

continued in use throughout th e l at te r h al f of t he f ou rt h ce nt ury and into thefifth. More of them must have come into Britain during that time. We must

remember, for example, that, still d ur in g t he reign of Valentini an an d presumablyafter 368, at least on e tribe of Germanic federates-Alamanni under their kingFraomar-were settled somewhere in Britain.v- They may possibly have had thiskind of equipment. Then, in 383 M ag nu s M ax im us took an army from Britainto help hi m in his bi d for th e rule o f t he west. The next fifteen years ar e obscure,but in 398-9 th e general Stilicho had again to restore some sort of order in Britain,and presumably he brought a continental army to do it. The Wall was neverrefortified, but York, and perhaps Catterick too, m us t h av e b ee n held. I t is strangethat none of our metalwork has been found at York, but th e tw o buckles atCatterick do suggest th e presence there of a military unit. One of them is abarbarous locally-made piece of type I A, and it s ho uld b el on g to a date later

than 368-83. I t was stratified in th e same level as th e fine continentally-madebuckle of type IV B and an illegible late fourth or early fifth century coin. Takentogether these objects suggest that the mil it ary unit was of Stilicho's r at he r t ha nof Cou nt Theodosius' army, but of course it is impossible to be certain. Like

7' Stevens (1940).7' We m us t assume that th e garrisons of th e other 'Saxon-Shore' forts were also b ro ug ht u p to strength

by ne w troops a t this time.

7' Ammianus Marcellinus, Historiae, XXIX, 4.




Theodosius, Stilicho must have taken steps to consol ida te the defences of th e'Saxon Shore'. We can see this from tiles at Pevensey which were stamped wi th t hename of Honorius, and from the late coins at Richborough. Undoubtedly someof t he metalwork from this fort belongs to th e Stilicho period but it is nearly

impossible to say which. One could, however, point to th e stylized buckles oftype II I A from here an d from Bradwell, for these seem, on the evidence of th eSpontin grave, to be relat ively late in date.

In 407, a certain Constantine, another usurper set up by th e British, removed

t he ar my from Britain in order to take control of Gaul, which had been invadedby barbarians. Defea ted no t long after, Constantine was later executed byHonorius. His action had v ir tual ly s tr ipped Bri ta in of her armed forces andbrought to an end all effective Roman rule. We have no evidence that an yofficial Roman army ever returned after this date.zs We can be reasonablycertain, therefore, that the bulk of the imported mili tary metalwork had arrivedin Britain before this t ime.

BRONZE BUCKLES MADE IN BRITAIN IN TH E LATE AN D SUB

R OM AN P ER IO DS : TYPES I AN D I I(excluding II c)

Types I and II are by fa r th e most numerous among British finds of zoomorphic buckles. Type II A, with over twenty examples, is the largest of th e subgroups. The complete form is illustrated by only one find, the compositepiece from Colchester (FIG. 17, e). The rest of th e group is made up by finds ofdetached loops and plates. From th e scarcity of continental parallels it is clearthat this type is most unusual outside Britain. I have found few examples abroad;there is a solitary arcaded plate in t he m us eum at Worms, and another withsimilar decoration bu t different hinge-mechanism from the cemetery of KrefeldGellep. The best-known parallels are two complete buckles from the Vermandcemetery i s - one (FIG. 6, b) has a p lat e wi th two pierced round-headed arches,which is nearly identical with an example from Caerwent (FIG. 17, a); the other(FIG. 6, a) has s imi la r arches in four opposed pa i r s -a design found only once overhere, on t he example from Caistor-by-Norwich (FIG. 17, g). The loops, on th eo th er h an d, are rather different. Admit ted ly they all have pai rs of confronteddolphins which, especial ly on th e Colchester and Leicester (FIG. 17, i) loops, ar e

very like the Vermand examples, but they have additional features which do notoccur on the Vermand buckles. These are the character ist ic involut ion of th e loopterminals, and the curled side wings of th e tongues. T he Verm and bucklesha ve t he s tr ai ght hinge-bar, which is more normal at this period, and straight,double or single, tongue. There are, of course, many different types of buckleswith confronted dolphins on th e loops, bu t t he involut ed loop is rare on th e

73 Arguments, based on the ambiguous informat ion in th e Notitia Dignitatum, have been put fowardto prove that Britain was re-occupied after 407. T he se w er e discredited in S tevens (1940), an d are nolonger tenable.

74 Ec k (r891), pI. xv, 7 an d xvi, ra.



FIG. 7

STRAP-END FROM BABENHAUSEN(HESSEN), GERMANY. Sc. ;


were made by local craftsmen wh o were not closely familiar w ith t he better products of th e continental workshops. Was not the whole series in fact a Britishdevelopment? Was not the Colchester buckle, w hi ch s ta nd s at th e head of thisdevelopment, produced with others like it in some official workshop in Britain,

later to be copied and imitated at second or third hand as th e demand for suchmetalwork grew? I t is difficult to be sure, but i t is quite possible. I t may evenbe that the continental examples of th e typewere Brit ish-made pieces, or copies of such,

that had travelled back to G au l, p er ha pswith the troops of Magnus Maximus in383. Certainly it is a mistake to assume thatth e traffic in ideas was enti rely one-way.

O f th e two buckles which hav e beenp la ce d t og et he r in type II B th e examplefrom Richborough (FIG. I9, a) is clearly

a degenerate one-piece copy of th e composite II A form. The Sleaford buck le (FIG.

I9, b) is artistically more impressive and fa rbetter made, but it probably had a similarongm.

Buckles of types I A and I B ar e alsovery numerous in Britain. Taken togethert he y m ak e an impressive group numberingover thirty pieces. They are by fa r th esmallest of all th e buckles in th e corpus, andw it h t he ir long narrow plates they a re v er ydistinctive. They have no exact continental parallels and are indisputably ofBritish manufacture.z> Natu ra ll y cer ta in of their features ar e taken from thecontinental repertory. As we have seen, loops w it h s tr ai gh t hinge-bars andconf ronted dolph ins do occur on the continent, alth oug h they are not th ecommonest form. Then again, the outward-facing horse-heads of th e I B

loops a re p ar al le le d to some extent on con temporary continental metalwork.Certain objects spring to mind at once, namely th e famous strap-ends fromBabenhausen on th e Rhine near Mainz (FIG. 7),78 whose horse-heads keepcompany with panels of fine mosaic-style chip-carving and engraving, and awhole series of similar but cruder strap-ends.tv Most of these come from th e

frontier districts of Germany. From here the style was transmitted to th e north,where very s imilar horse -heads occur on nearly contemporary Scandinavianmetalwork.w The appearance of th e style in Britain is p ro ba bl y a ga in to beex pla in ed b y th e activities of th e Roman armies.

7i Werner (1958), p. 383, is c er ta in ly w ro ng w he n he says that buckles of this type ar e of northGerman origin. He appears in an y case to think that t he t yp e IE buckle from Dorchester is th e o nl y o neof its k ind. Th e Frisian objects he compares it with bear only th e slightest resemblance to it.

78 Salin (1904), fig. 335; Behrens (1930), fig. 1 0 , no. 38; Forssander (1937), fig. 25, I .

79 Behrens (1930), fig. 12; Werner (1958), pp . 4II- I2 , fig. IS.80 Forssander (1937), fig. I .

3



M E D I E VA L A R C H A E O L O G Y

illl

I

FIG. 8STRAP-END FROM

TORTWORTH, GLOS.Sc. }

A lt ho ug h n o tw o of th e ty pe I B buckle-loops are exactly alike and some aremore stylized than others, they are all very similar. The few type I plates thathave survived are more varied, and on e or tw o are very fine. The tw o mostinteres ting certainly came from the same workshop. The se, from Duston inNorthamptonshire (FIG. IS , 0) and Cirencester in Gloucestershire (FIG. IS , n),h av e e ng ra ve d d ec or at io n composed of roundels a lt er na ti ng w it h cross-hatched

geometric panels, and enclosed b et we en b or de rs ofrunning scroll design. I know of on e other objectwhich was made in th e same workshop. This is thestrap-end from Tortworth, Gloucestershire (FIG. 8) ,now in th e Bristol Museum. It s f lanking horse-headsalone would have established its relationship with ourbuckles, but it also ha s a d ec or at ed r ou nd el andcross-hatched triangle which are identical with thoseon the Cirencester plate. There is a fragment of athird buckle-plate f rom Silchester (FIG. IS , q), whichmay have co me from this workshop. Simpler cross-hatched geometric panels and roundels occur on theDorchester example (FIG. I , no . 16), and cross-hatchedpanels alone on th e Popham plate (FIG. IS , p) and ona second piece f rom Cirencester (FIG. 13, l). The longplate on the buckle of type I A from Upper Upham(FIG. 13, g) has only a single line of running scrolls.Despite th e v ar yi ng q ua li ty of t he w or km an sh ip onthese plates it ca n be seen that they form a distinctivestylistic group, a nd it is a s tyle for which it is difficult to

find an origin abroad. The running spirals, as we haveseen (p. IS) , occur on both sides of the Channe l. Thecross-hatching also ha s a limited existence on th e continental metalwork, but it cannot be called a prominent fea tu re there .w Among finds of continental typeth e strap-end from Ixworth (see p. 14) provides th eb es t a na lo gy for this, but, as we have seen above, thisobject may conceivably have been made in Britain.These are minor points, however. The combinationof forms and decoration which we see on the buckles

and plates of type I is a new development, confined to Britain.

The least characteristic but perhaps the most interest ing of al l these Bri ti shbuckles is th e buckle of type I B f ro m S ta nw ic k in Yorkshire (FIG. 15, m). Thisha s long been famous. On its p la te a re a pair of engraved and stylized peacocksconfronted on either side of a tree. This design ha s been compared to that on abronze nail -cleaner from Rivenhall in Essex 8z which is like it in subject if not in

8, I t makes occasional appearances on the chip-carved metalwork: cf. Riegel (19 27) , pI. xxii, 5;Forssander (1937), figs. 19, zd an d 24, 2; Be hr en s (1 93 0) , fig. 8, 3; Eck (189 1), pI. xv, 13b.

8, Tonn o ch y an d Hawkes (1931).




treatment. This motive and others like it, such as birds or animals confrontedagainst vases, were introduccd i nt o t he Roman Empire from th e eastern Mediterranean and were characteristic of e ar ly C hr is ti an a rt . In t he l ate Roman periodwe find this style in western E ur ope o n th e 'Spangen' helmets and on Christian

sarcophagi.fc I t was taken over by t he F ra nk is h settlers and employed on someof their metalwork, notably a class of wire-inlaid iron buckles which have appliedrepousse plates.s- A few of these h av e b ee n f ou nd in England.s- and here we againsee the confron ted peacocks, a lt ho ug h n ow in an advanced state of stylization.These buckles belong to th e en d of th e fifth century. The decoration of th eStanwick buckle, therefore, belonged to a style which was almost universal inth e late Roman Empire, and current in Gaul at l east as late as th e second halfof th e fifth c en tu ry, w he n t he F ra nk is h settlements were being established. Thereis every reason to suppose that it was well known to the populat ion of late andsub-Roman Britain, especially to t he C hr is ti an c om mu ni ty. The survival of sofew examples here is probably only du e to chance.

We must no w consider the date of th e buckles of type I and II . Buckles oftype II A have been found in several helpful contexts. There was a g oo d e xa mp lein th e late fourth-century filling of th e theatre at St. Albans (FIG. 18, d). Anotherrather more stylized example (FIG. I7,J) was found in th e debris that sealed thebath-block furnace of the villa at Lullingstone, in Kent. Stratified with it weretwo coins of Valens, and this would seem to put th e loss of th e buckle somewherewithin th e last qu arter o f th e f ou rt h c en tu ry. At Lydney in Gloucestershireanother such buckle was found (FIG. 17, k) in th e original make-up of th e floor ofth e temple cella. Wheeler dated the const ruct ion of this some time after 367.86The most interesting finds ar e certainly those from North Wraxall (FIG. 18, b)

and Caistor-by-Norwich(FIG.

17, c and g). That th e villa at North Wra xa ll m etwith a violent en d is evident from th e broken masonry and corpses tumbled inth e well. I t is one of many villas in the west which suffered a similar fate. The coinseries at North Wraxa ll ends with several of Grat ian (367-383), and this, seeingthat th e site is within s tr ik ing d is tance of th e Bristol C ha nn el , mo st stronglysuggests that it was sacked by Irish pirates, probably in th e years after 388 whenBritain, on th e death of Maximus, was left without adequate defence.s> Thebuckle of type II A may thus belong to this time or a l it tle before. The situationat Caistor-by-Norwich was similar and equally dramatic. Building 4, in whichparts of two buckles of type II A were found , was burnt down and its occupantsapparently put to the sword. The victims of th e massacre were left unburied- in

on e room no less than thirty-six skulls were found together w ith other human8 ) Alfoldi (1934); Leeds (1936), pI. viia, fig. 4.84 See especially th e piece from Envermeu (Seine Infcrieurc) which has th e t ree flanked by peacocks:

Cochet (1854), pI. xii, 4; Leeds (1936), fig. 4; Werner (1953), pI. vi, 9. There is a more stylized renderingof t he s am e design on a buckle in t he m us eu m at Epernay.

85 There is an interesting example on a plate f rom Howle tt s , Kent: Smith (1923), fig. 37; also adegenerate version on a buckle from Broadstairs, Kent: Evison (1958), p. 241, fig. I .

86 Wheeler (1932), p. 86.8 ) This summary of the situation at North Wraxall has b ee n t ak en from my husband, Professor

C. F. C. Hawkes's chapter on Roman Wiltshire, in th e forthcoming archaeological volume of th e VictoriaCounryHistory, Wiltshire.




bones. These events, which must surely have marked th e en d of Roman Caistor,seem, from coin evidence, to have t ak en p la ce not long after 400. Historically,th e most likely time for the disaster is t he p er io d i mm ed ia te ly after th e withdrawal of th e Roman army from Britain by t he u su rp er Constantine, in 407.With th e ' Sa xo n S ho re ' n ow u nd ef en de d by regular troops Caistor was exposedto attack from th e sea, and probably me t its fate at t he h an ds of Saxon raiders.The two buckles were found on th e latest occupation-level, their loss beingapparently con temporary with the destruction of building 4.

From this series of dates we can see that buckles of type II A ma y have comeinto use soon after the mil itary reoccupat ion of Count Theodosius, and we haveclear and direct evidence of their use down to t he ear ly years of th e fifth century.Bu t from the numbers of devolved examples of the type, from their appearance inthree Anglo-Saxon graves, and from th e fact that th e Anglo-Saxon buckles oftype II c appear to be partly modelled on them, it is reasonable to suggest thatthei r manufac ture and use extended into sub-Roman times, down to t he m id dl eyears of th e fifth century.

The buckles of type I ar e less easy to date, since there are so few reliableassociations. The most that can be said is that th e examples from Richborough(FIG. IS, f and g), Dorchester (FIG. I, no. 16), Chichester (FIG IS, h) andCatterick (FIG. IS, d) must have been lost or buried at the en d of th e fourth orearly in th e fifth cen tury. Several others have been found at Silchester (FIG.IS,] , i , j) and Cirencester (FIGS. IS, band l; IS, b, c and n) and these two townsar e among th e few that have so far produced evidence of occupation extendingwell i nto the fifth century. 88 Then again, th e buckles of type I have occurred in anunusually large number of Anglo-Saxon graves (FIGS. 14 and 16), and there isalso strong evidence to suggest that they influenced th e style of on e or two pieces

of early Anglo-Saxon metalwork.w This mus t imp ly that buckles of type I werestill being worn in th e middle of th e fifth ce ntu ry w hen th e Anglo-Saxon settlements of th e south of England were being established. How early they were madeis uncertain, but probably they began only towards the en d of th e fourth century,that is, somewhat after the o th er types we have bee n discussing. One thing isdefinite: th e type I and type II buckles represent th e last recognizable phase ofprovincial Roman metalwork in Britain.sv D ur in g t he fifth century, little thatwas ne w seems to have come in from Europe before th e advent of Anglo-Saxonsbring ing the ir ow n styles of pottery and metalwork. We must therefore imaginethat these last examples of Romano-Bri t ish craf twork were precious and had along life.

I t will be remembered that the d is tr ibut ion of t he i mp or te d buckles and

88 Fo r t he l at e o c cu p at io n of Silchester, see O'Neil (1944); and Boon (1957) an d (1959). Fo r information about Cirencester I am grateful to Professor Donald Atkinson, w ho h as r ec en tl y b ee n w or ki ng onth e coins from th e town.

89 N o ta bl y t he strap-end from Chessell Down, Lo.W.: cr. Hillier (1856), fig. 65 ; Evison (1955),pI. viii, a, no. 40. T hi s h as h or se -h ea d and cross-hatched decoration. Horse-heads an d chip-carving occuron th e belt-sl ide from High D ow n, g ra ve 12: cf Archaeologia, L lV (1895), pI. xxvii, 8; Evison (1955) , pI.vii i, c and d. These ar e discussed in m o re d et ai l in Chadwick Hawkes (1961), pp . 36-7 and 54-5, fig. 2 ,

pl. xvi i, b.QO Pe n annular brooches were made throughout this period, but they ar e a native Celt ic type.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N

lA n INS I1A JII

FlOIII lOMAN 11m

• • • •...

FlOIii l ANGLO-IAXOU llTEl CJ C l 6. V'

( H ~ N ( [FINDS A

10 20 3ll 40 50 .0 70 MILES

I I

0 10 30 50 70 Klil.l ; ; ; U l;;;;1 !

L- - - l L ~ " " _ _ ' _ _ _ '

FIG. 9

DISTRIBUTIO:,\ OF BRITISH-MADE B UC KL ES , T YP ES I AN D II (pp. 28 ff.)

27



MEDIEVAL A R C H A E O L O G Y

belt-fi tt ings discussed in th e previous section was predominantly south-eastern,except for th e D or ch es te r g ra ve -g ro up , t wo other finds in th e upper Thamesvalley, and outliers at Leicester, Catteriek, and Holbury. The distribution ofth e British-made buckles of types I and II is markedly different (FIG. 9), and sincethey both occur in th e s am e area s we will consider them together. There is asmall group at Riehborough, two of I B an d on e of II B, and a few strays in th eneighbouring Anglo-Saxon cemeteries. From north-west Kent there is th e II A

bu ckle fro m L ullin gs to ne ; fro m Essex tw o e xa mp le s, the II A prototype fromColchester an d th e I B piece from Gestingthorpe; from Suffolk a single devolvedII A buckle. There is a I A buckle f rom London and from near by a II A examplefrom an Anglo-Saxon grave at Mitcham. There are two finds from th e south,both of type I A, f rom Chichester and from an Anglo-Saxon burial on BeddinghamHill. Verulamium has produced on e of th e II A type. In th e fa r north we haveth e I B buckle from Stanwick and th e I A piece f rom Cat te rick . These ar e outliers.The majority of both types comes from towns and other sites in th e west, th e

south-west, an d in th e midlands. There ar e g ro up s f ro m Caerwent, Cirencesterand Silchester, m or e s ca tt er ed finds from villas and villages in Wiltshire andGloucestershire, from th e Roman temple at Lydney, from a river por t nea r Bristol,and f rom Dorches te r. A few more have c om e fr om A ng lo -S ax on graves in th evalleys of the upper Thames and th e Warwickshire Avon. There is an importantgroup from in and around Water Newton, Hunts., and others at Duston,Northants., Leicester, an d Caistor-by-Norwich. Single finds occur at sites inRutland and south Lincolnshire. North of this there is n ot hi ng u nt il we reachCatterick.

This dist ribut ion is at once interesting and puzzling. I f we assume that th efinds in th e graves of Anglo-Saxons were in most cases plundered from Roman

sites near their settlements, we ca n see from th e map (FIG. 9) that, apart from th efinds in Yorkshire, th e buckles of types I an d II lie beh ind o r along a line extendingfrom th e Bristol Channel in th e west to th e basin of th e Wash in th e east. I twill be remembered too that, once a ga in w it h t he exception of a find at Catterick,th e imported types of buckles and belt-fittings have no t been found north ofthis l ine either. What then is th e significance of this pattern of distribution?An y answer, however tentative, must depend on th e answer to a second question.Who wore these buckles? Were th e British-made buckles also a military fashion,manufactured for th e army in Britain to b rin g th em into line with th e troopson th e continent-manufactured in B ri ta in b ec au se th e imported metalworkwas no t sufficient to m ee t th e demand? O r w er e t he y s imply a civil fashion thathad been copied from the mil it ary?

Le t us begin with a reminder about th e function of buckles. I t is al l too easyto think of them solely as ornamental metalwork and forget t he ir r ea l purpose,which is to fasten belts or st raps. Belts ar e so common a feature of modern dress,especially that of women, that there is a tendency to forget that in antiquitythey were worn only where th e type of dress really requ i red them. In th e Romanworld belts seem to have been the almost exclusive prerogative of the soldier.We see them and their buckles as a prominent feature of th e uniforms of th e




soldiers of all ranks who a re commemora ted on th e tombstones and monuments.In Br it ain t he y a re no t well represented in th e archaeology, bu t th ey are foundon sites dating from th e earliest phases of th e Roman occupation. At Camulodunum, for example, there are mid first-century buckles of two main types:

buckles which in smaller, plainer, form exactly foreshadow our involuted bucklesof type II A ; and buckles which, with their narrow D-shaped loops and rectangularplates, are the simpler forerunners of our buckles of type 1. 91 They occur onother military sites too, but rarely in civilian contexts. The later history of thesetwo types is difficult to trace, but there is no reason to suppose that versionsof them di d no t continue in use throughout th e succeeding centuries. Certainlyour buckles of types I and II appear to hold them in memory. They seem, in fact ,to be hybrid types modelled both on these early military buckles, already knownin Br itain , and the new 'ch ip-carved' an d zoomorphic continental metalworkthat began to appear in Britain after 368. Thus there is a military backgroundto their production. They ar e found in associations that are military, too. Wehave them at Richborough, the site which has produced th e largest group ofcontinental military metalwork, and in th e German woman's grave at Dorchester,next to th e soldier's grave. The example at Catterick was found in th e sameoccupation-level of th e same building as th e fine buckle of type IV E, which cameoriginally from th e Rhineland, and was perhaps worn by a member of t he lat eRoman army in th e north. The Stanwick piece, too, is most credibly explainedby a military context. Finally, at Holbury, Caistor and Leicester buckles of typeII A were found in areas that also produced an example of the continental mili tarymetalwork. Surely this is significant.

But now, what about th e west, w he re the re is no imported metalwork? I f

these bucklesof

typesI and II ar e

military,what ar e

wedoing with an army here?

We ar e almost in th e dark, but there is one find that may shed a li tt le l ight . Onebuckle of type II A was found at th e villa of North Wraxall, which, as we havesuggested above, seems to have been sacked and destroyed by Irish pirates.North Wraxall produced another find which is of interest, n am el y t he crescentshaped ornament, composed of a pair of boar tusks united by a decorated bronzemount,» which is paralleled by similar, more f ragmentary, finds f rom Richborough (FIG. IO). 93 A complete example was found in the cemetery of Monceaule-Neuf, Aisne.v- where it was part of the furniture of one of those rich warriorgraves discussed above (FIG. I I), an d ye t another was found in a grave at Brumath(Brocomagus) near Strasbourg, on th e u pp er R hin e frontier.vs At an earlier

per iod bronze ornaments of similar form a re known to have been used as horsetrappings, since they are depicted on equestrian sculptures as pendants to th e

9' Hawkes an d Hull (1947), pp . 335 ff., pl. cii,9' Wilts. Archaeol. Mag., VI I (1862), 70-73 , pl. vi, I I.

93 Roach Smith (1850), fig. on p. 110; Bushe-Fox (1949), p. 14', pl. xlvi, 173-4. There is anotherf ra gm en ta ry e xa mp le a m on g a group of miscellaneous bronzes an d late Roman co in s f ro m a site atSouthery, in west Norfolk, now preserved in the Bri ti sh M u s eu m , R eg . no . 1880, 11-24,60.

94 Pilloy, II I ( ' 9 ' 2 ) , pp . 115 ff., pl. v; Boulanger (1905), pis. x and xx ; Werner (1949), pp . 248-257,figs. 1-4.

95 Werner (1949), p. 252, fig. 5.




horses' breast-bands.ss I t seems likely therefore that th e boar-tusk ornaments hada similar use among th e half-barbarian cavalry of the lat e Roman army. Thusth e examples f rom Richborough ar e probably to be explained by those same

~ )

- : // /

/ // /

I 1/ I

/ I1 I

I II II II \

\\

\\

-,-,

<,< ,

-:/ 1/ I

/ I/ \

II

II\\\

\-,

-,<,

IIII\

\\

\

\\

FIG. 1 0

BOAR-TUSK O R N A M E N T S ~ F R O MRICHBOROUGH, KENT (p. 29). Sc.

96 Fo r first-century bronze examples see Hawkes an d Hull (1947), pI. ciii, 17; E. Ritterling, 'Dasfruhrornische Lager bei Hofheim im Taunus,' Annalen des Vereins fu r Nassauische Altertumskunde und Geschichtsforschung, XL (1913), pI. xiv. See also Germania, XI I (1928), p. 24, fig. 3. There a re sculptural representationson Trajan's column at Rome, an d occasionally on tombstones, e.g. Mainzer Zeitschrift, XI (1916), pI. x, 6.



FIG. I I

MONCEAU-LE-NEUF (AISNE), FRANCEM il it ar y g ra ve showing boar-tusk ornament in

dish near feet (p. 29)After Boulanger (1905)


Germanic soldiers wh o left behind their weapons and buckles (see p. 17). An dto return to North Wraxall, it seems justi fiable to suggest that we have evidence

here for the presence of at least onemember of t he l at e Roman army. The

villa may have been g ra nted h im onretirement, or he may have been oneof a unit of t roops bil leted there. Buton the whole it is more probable that

he belonged to a detachment called into defend th e place during th e raidsthat caused its destruction. The bodiesin th e well are mute testimony thatsome fight ing took place. Such a situa ti on cou ld well account for th e lossnot only of the boar tusks, but of th ebuckle too. Finally, the situation atCaistor calls for a s imilar explanation.Here th e defeated defenders seem tohav e be en de cap it at ed. Their bodieswere no doubt first stripped of weapons and ornaments and th e best ofth e loot carried off. The buckle-fragments of type II A could be explainedas p ar t o f th e equipment of th e defending forces, broken perhaps in th e fight

ing, and thrown aside by the retreatingraiders before they set fire to th ebuilding.

This is speculation of course, buti t is based on evidence that is difficultto interpret in any other way, andit leads us to further speculationsabout the dispositions of th e army inth e la te fourth and fifth centuries. Weknow something about th e frontiertroops, especially of th e 'Saxon Shore',

at the time of Count Theodosius's reorganization. We know from th eNotitia that there was a field army,but we know little else, and we knownext to nothing about th e provisionsfor defence made by Stilicho at th every end of the century. Is it possiblet ha t o ur types I and II buckles can be

of assistance here? As we have seen, some of them have military associations. Does




th e whole series reflect some otherwise unknown disposition of troops? I t couldvery well do so.

The destruction of North Wraxa ll t ogethe r w ith m an y other villas in th ewest during the late fourth century shows how dange rous was t he s it ua ti on forth e undefended rural estates which provided th e food for th e Diocese. The eventsof 368 must have shown bo w long was the reach of r ai di ng b an ds once theypenetrated the outer ring of defences. No doubt the towns were safe enoughbeh ind the ir walls, but the agricul tura l estates must have been easy prey to themarauders , and, if th e food supplies failed, th e whole economy of Roman Britainwould risk collapse. What could be more logical or more likely than that th e townsin th e danger zones would be given military garrisons.v" part of whose duty wasthe defence of th e villa estates within the ir districts? I f we can believe in such asystem, and it is not without its precedents in Gaul and elsewhere, we have acredible explanation of th e buckles at Caerwent, Cirencester and Silchester, someof the chief towns of the west. In the same way, th e curiously rigid distributionof such metalwork across tbe midlands could represent some form of inner' f rontier '-a reserve l ine of defence should the field army, presumably still basedon York, fail to hold the north . The Wall, it must be remembered, could nolonger be counted on as a secure defence even in 367. I f we see this phantomarmy as a semi-mobile fo rce -a sort of yeomanry- then the occurrence of bucklesat villas and other sites outside the towns need n ot u nd uly disturb us. And ifwe rely at all on th e evidence provided at North WI'axall we ca n see that th esystem was operating, in part at least, in the time of Maximus. It could conceivablyh av e b ee n i ns ti tu te d by him as a precaution before he took th e regular troopsof th e field army and th e 'Saxon Shore' away to Gaul in 383, and would expla inth e finds of late four th-century cont inenta l mil it ary metalwork at towns like

London, Leicester, Caistor and Catterick. The system will have continued inoperation after his time, and down to and probably after th e departure of Cons tantine with a second army in 407. In 4IO the Britons were authorized by Honoriusto take measures for t he ir own defence. What could be more likely than that theymaintained this force, thus accounting for the long life of th e buckles of typesI an d II after th e imported metalwork had ceased to be used? The implicationsar e fascinating. Such troops, mainta ined throughout th e first half of the fifthcentury, and based on th e towns of th e west and midland regions of Britain, couldvery easily have been the model for th e forces which Ambrosius Aurelianus andthe dux bellorum Arthur used against t he invad ing Saxons dur ing the second halfof that century.

I f we consider the other alternative, that is, that buckles of types I and II

were worn by civilians in imitation of military custom, we find little supportingevidence. Belts and buckles ar e never shown on sculpture as part of civil iandress, and buckles a re never found in civil graves. The civilian costume ofthe later

9 6a This idea is no t entirely u ns up po rt ed b y o t he r evidence. It is no w known t h at , d u ri n g th e fourthc e nt ur y, t he defences of Romano-Brit ish walled towns w e re b e in g adapted, w it h th e provision of bastionsan d wider ditches, to accommodate th e use of ballistae (Philip Corder, 'The reorganization of the defencesof Romano-British towns in th e fourth century,' Archaeol. ] . , CXII (1956), 2 0 - 4 2 ) . The introduction ofartillery defence implies some sort of military garrison.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N 33Roman period seems to have consisted of a dress or tunic caught in at th e waistby a narrow girdle, apparently tied, and cloak or mantle fastened at th e shoulderby a pi n or brooch. Brooches and pins are common finds on civil sites, but buckles,even in the fourth century, ar e extremely rare except in military contexts. In

Gaul, for example, it is noticeable that buckles occur only in th e military zoneand in th e graves of th e German laeti. 97 Therefore, we are forced to conclude thatif ou r buckles of types I and II were w or n by Romano-British civilians, it was aphenomenon peculiar to the wes te rn and midland par ts of Britain at the end of

the fourth and during th e first part of th e fifth century. But th e western region,where our buckles cluster so thickly on the dis tr ibut ion-map, was th e very areain which was felt th e main force of the Celtic revival that was taking place duringthis same fifth century A . D . This movement seems primarily to have been apolit ical one, leading to th e reappearance of Celtic chiefs and kinglets, withtheir capi tals in th e o ld t ri ba l centres, yet it mus t have had cultural repercussionstoo. The penannular brooch was th e traditional Celtic dress-fastener and it wasstill in usc at this period. I t is thus diff icul t to see what t he l ate Roman buckleswere doing in this region unless they had some military association. In the presentstate of knowledge, therefore, th e military explanation is th e best one.

At this point a last word must be said about t he m il it ar y g ra ve at Dorchester.So fa r I have not a t tempted to date th e burial; deliberately, since t he p robl em ofdating is a difficult one. As we have seen, graves of this general type begin inth e second half of th e fourth century and run on i nt o t he fifth, though we do notknow how far. Such coin evidence as we have suggests very s trongly that mostof th e cemeteries of north Gaul, such as Furfooz, Vermand, and AbbevilleHomblieres , which contained these graves, went out of use during t he e ar ly part

of th e fifth cen tury. This is usually accounted for by th e disastrous events of 407,w he n t he co mbi ne d tribes of th e Alans, Vandals and Suevi, having crossed th efrozen Rhine ncar Mainz on th e last da y of December 406, invaded and ravagedGaul from en d to end. Stilicho had had to withd raw the field army to Ita ly in4°1, and Gaul seems to have been without defenders except for her frontierforces. Many walled cities fell before the ons laught and were sacked a nd b urn t.Among th e casualties wer e most of th e towns of north Gau l, Tou rnai , Amiens,Arras, Reims and Trier. A contemporary poet tells us that ' the whole of Gaulla y reeking on a single pyre'. ,)8 Such a catas t rophe must h av e d es tr oy ed th esettled wa y of life of m any of th e inhabitants o f n or th Gaul, and many of th elaeti and foederati may h ave t hr ow n in t he ir l ot w it h t he i nva ders . Others may

have been too impoverished to continue with the custom of furnished burial.At an y rate, we find few of their burials that ca n be securely dated after 407.

But on e we have. The burial at Vieuxville (p. 5) cannot, from its coins,h av e t ak en place before 4 I I, and p er hap s n ot for some little time after. Thus

97 All th e women's graves that have been found to contain buckles or belt-sets seem to have been th egraves of t h e w o me nf ol k of these frontier troops. At Dorchester, too, we know from th e brooches tha tth e woman wa s a Gcrman. T h a t Germans of both sexes adopted th e fashion for buckles a t t hi s p er io d ,an d continued to usc them, evolving ne w types, is well authenticated by th e grave-finds of t he f ou rt hto seventh centuries. This fashion wa s certainly du e to their c os tu me , w hi ch d if fe re d from tha t of th eRoman provincials.

9 8 Orientius, Commonitorium, II , l S I : ' U n o fumavit G a ll ia t o ta rogo'.



34 M E D I E VA L A R C H A E O L O G Y

we have evidence here that th e characteristic furniture of the continental militarygraves, including some of t he chip- ca rved mater ia l, d id in places continue in uscat least throughout th e first q ua rte r o f th e fifth century. In some r emote par tsof th e frontier it may have gone on a little later, especially if there was no otherstyle to supersede it. We have an illustration of this at Sucidava in Rournania,??

where a group of chip-carved belt-fitt ings seems to have con ti nued in usc wellinto the second q ua rt er o f th e fifth century. In the western parts of th e frontierthere is strong presumptive evidence that in th e first h al f o f th e fifth cen tu ry theofficial workshops were producing a ne w style of buckle, type II I E, to be discussed in m or e d eta il in the next section. What is of particular interest to ushere is that these fifth-century buckles ar e often found in association with pla instrap-ends of type v, similar to those from Dorchester and Milton.rvv While thisdoes not preclude such plain strap-ends from commencing at th e end of the fourthcentury, i t certainly implies that some of them, at least, continued to be madeand used well into the fifth. A lt ho ug h n ei th er t he D orc hes ter no r the Miltongroups contained buckles of type II I E, which would put them into the fifthcen tu ry without a doubt, their plain strap-ends make it dangerous to be to ocategorical about thei r date. In a recent paper Werner ha s given his opinion thatth e man buried at Dorchester was an early free Saxon settler.>» But he must bewrong. It is far too soon for such settlers, and in any case on e would not expectto find them so far inland in the early fifth century, no r buried so close to th ewalls of a town like Dorchester. As we have said before, the Dorches te r Saxon wasthere in some military capacity, either as a member of a garrison billeted inth e to wn i tse lf or as a federate sett led near by. Two explanations ar e possible. Hema y have come over with th e forces of Sti licho, at th e very en d of th e fourthcentury, perhaps to remain behind when Const an ti ne r emoved the m ai n a rm y in

407; or, in view of the suggested maintenance of a military force after 407, hemay have a rr ived only after 410, presumably as on e of a group of mercenariesaccompanied by t he ir o wn womenfolk. The employment of such half-barbarianfighting men to ac t as 'wa tchdogs' must by this time have been a familiar idea.Later still, we see this same tradition reflected in the employment of Hengest andhis followers by th e British king Vortigern. The system had its uses and its dangers.It was perhaps inevitable that th e course of events in Britain should follow thatin Gaul, an d that here also watchdog should become master.

BRONZES OF THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD:TYPES I I C, I I I B AND V B

We come now to a handful of objects, a few buckles and a strap-end, which

differ from the characteristic late Roman types, and which have been found in thiscountry only in Anglo-Saxon graves.

99 Tudor (1954), p. 5'9 . They w e re f ou nd close to two coin-hoards in which the latest coins were ofThcodosius I I (408-50). Tudor has suggested that th e deposition of t he h oa rd s and th e loss of t he b el tf it tings is to be connected with Attila's destruction of this part of th e frontier in 443.

10 0 Attention is paid to them in Werner (1958), pp . 39 I ff., list on pp . 410- I I , map, fig. '5 ; see alsopI. lxvii, I.

,0< Ibid., p. 383.

"




FIG. 12

BUCKLE FROM FRILFORD. BERKS.Sc. J

The two buckles of type I I c, one from an unrecorded grave at Bifrons, Kent,(FIG. I9 , c; type II C, I ) , and th e other from grave 26 at High Down, Sussex(FIG. I 9 , d; type II C, 2 ) , were almost certainly made in the same workshop,probably by an Anglo-Saxon. Certainly there is no exact paral le l for this par

ticular form. But the craftsman who made th em had surely seen examples ofthe British II A type, [or he has copied th e involuted terminals of th e loops andpreserved th e distinctive side wings to th etongue in vest igial form on th e H igh D ow n

piece- the tongue of th e Bifrons buckle ismissing. He has abandoned the confron teddolphins, however, in favour of pairs of confronted animal heads at th e ends of th eunusual double h inge-bar. The heads ar every like those on the buckles of type II I andit is evident that the craftsman was familiarwith the late Roman continental style.Presumably, therefore, these II C buckleswere made very short ly after th e establishment of th e Anglo-Saxon sett lements insouthern Britain, that is, early in th e secondhalf of th e fifth century. Certainly th e High D ow n bu ria l cannot have tak enplace much, if at all, after 5 0 0 . With t he b uc kl e was a n a nn ula r b ro och w it hV-shaped pin-slit, ball-stop knobs, and stamped decoration, and this is a latefifth-century type.tv- The little semi-circular-headed bow-brooch is also an earlyform. The Bifrons buckle came from a collection of ung rouped mater ia l from

what must have been some of th e earliest graves in th e cemetery, or indeed inall Kent. This collection also produced the type I B loop (FIG. I 5 , k; type I B,

I3). Wherever they were made, the fact that one II c buckle was found in Kentand th e other in Sussex is interesting. The existence of a cultural link betweenth e two kingdoms is evident from the d is tr ibut ion of another type of AngloSaxon metalwork, also of fifth-century date.>»

There is another curious buckle from either an Anglo-Saxon or a Romangrave at Frilford, Berks (FIG. I2), ' 04 which has no t been classified, but whichdeserves mention here because it, too, seems to have b een in some way derivedfrom th e buckles of type II A. I t appears to be unique, but whether it is of AngloS axon make it is impossible to say.

We have two examples of th e buckles of type II I B; on e comes from awoman's grave at Long Wittenham, Berks. (FIG. 20 , g; type II I B, I ) , the otherfrom an unknown grave at Sarre, Thanet (FIG. 20 , h ; type II I D, 2 ) . They ar eexamples of a continental t yp e w hi ch has recently been discussed by Werner.rve

'0 2 Chadwick Hawkes ( 1961) , p. 46 f.

r0 3 Loc. cit. in note 1 0 2 .

" 4 Proc, Soc. Antiq. 2 ser., I I I (1864-7),136. Roman an d Anglo-Saxon graves were found close togetherat this site. No grave-groups were recorded.

lO S Breuer and Roosens (1957), appendix by Wer ne r, p p. 320-3 , pls. v i-vi ii ; Werner (1958), pp .389 fr. an d 409 ff., pis. lxxvi, lxxvii an d lxxxi , 2.




He lists thirty-nine examples, a total to which our h it he rt o u np ub li sh ed S ar repiece adds one morc. The continental dist r ibution is interesting. The valley ofth e Meuse ha s produccd no less than twelve examples, th e Rhine below Mainzeight, n or th G er ma ny and n or th H ol la nd e ig ht , we st Belgium two, north-westFrance two, and th e Trier region two. There ar e also two outliers in east and

south Germany, well away from th e main groups. The dense concentration ofthese buckles on th e lower Rhine, in Belgium and north Germany, is of particularinterest to us here, for dearly it is from one of these regions that our two findsmust originally have come.

The II I B buckles ar e a one-piece development from t he h in ge d late RomanII I A form, but unlike them, they never occur in recognizably fourth-centurygraves. They are a f if th-century version of t he l at e f ou rt h- ce nt ur y style, and,according to Wern er, th ey were being made in th e workshops of th e Meusevalley throughout th e first half of th e fifth century, and perhaps even later.The buckles found in th e cemeteries of Krefeld-Gellep and th e Namur regionshow a variety of form that ca n only be the result of a compara tively longperiod of manufacture. I t is unfortunate that these cemeteries have neverb ee n p ro pe rl y published, for they are crucial to the under st anding o f eventsin this region,in th e fifth century. Such famous and important cemeteries asSamson and Epravevf were e xc av at ed n on e too well during th e last century,and many of thei r grave associations were unrecorded. Consequently the chronological sequence of the bur ia ls has long been a subject of controversy. Fortunatelyon e cemetery of this kind in the Namur reg ion has been excavated in this centuryand t he r ec en t p ub li ca ti on is an excellent study in which, for th e first time, acoherent picture ha s emerged.v» The earliest grave at Haillot, which belongs toth e second q ua rt er o f th e fifth century, wa s that of a man wearing a buckle of

type II I B very similar to the one from Long Wittenham. I t wa s a rich grave, andth e other furniture consisted of pottery vessels, a glass cone-beaker, a francisca(throwing axe), six arrows, a comb, a strap-end, an open-work disc-headed rivet,and three fourth-century Roman coins, too early to be of use for dating.tvsThis is a warrior grave, but it is o ne w hi ch shows marked differences from thosefourth-century graves discussed in the earlier sections of this paper. There isnone of th e characteristic la te fourth-century metalwork. Instead we have objectslike the francisca and the s trap-end , which ar e u nm is ta ka bl y t he k in d of thinggenerally associated with early Frankish graves. The remaining sixteen graves inth e cemetery give us a sequence of burials extending to about the year 500.Thus, as a whole, t he c em et er y extends from some time in the reign of th eemperor Valent inian III (425-50) down to a ti me w it hi n t he r ei gn of the Frankishking Clovis (482-SII). I t bridges the eventful years when Belgium and th e northof France were u nd ergo in g t he t ra ns it io n from Roman p ro vi nc e i nt o F ra nk is hkingdom. There is every reason to suppose that when they are properly examinedth e cemeteries of Samson and E pr av e, w hi ch produced similar material, will

, , 6 Del Marmol (1860); Bequet (1891).'°7 Breuer an d Roosens (1957).lOS Ibid., pp . 214 ff., figs. 12-13, grave I I .




tell the same story. That story is one of gradual change. Some of th e objects inthe cemetery, principal ly the pottery, the glass and th e buckles of type II I B,

are still fundamentally late Roman. But others, th e weapons at first and laterthe metalwork too, are slowly changing, unti l in th e latest graves we find some

early examples of cloisonne jewellery which we ca n definitely call truly Frankish.Who were these people who were buried at Haillot? The fact that nine out

of th e small total of seventeen graves contained weapons has led Breuer and Roosens to conclude that Haillot was the cemetery of a group of Frankish laeti. That

they rea lly were laeti is questionable. The settlement cannot have been establ ished long before t he da te of the earliest grave, that is before the per iod 425-50,and whereas we have no reason to suppose that new groups of laeti were beingsettled at this t ime, there is some documentary evidence that Sal ian Franks,who had migrated from th e distr ict of Toxandria they had occupied since 358,were pushing south i nto modern Belgium in th e years before 446. In this year alarge body of Franks under th e leadership of their chieftain Chlodio had reachedthe region of Tournai, Arras and Cambrai, where their farther advance waschecked for a whi le by the Roman general Aetius, who defeated them in battle atVicus Helena (probably Helesrnes between Tournai and Cambraij.rvv Aetiusapparently found it expedient to leave th e Franks in possession of th e Tournairegion an d confirm their terr i tor ial rights and limits by a foedus. Tournai thusb ec ame the Frank ish capital, and t he S al ia n federates served Aet ius well in 451in th e battle against Attila. According to Verlinden, the Frankish migra tion thatculminated in their settlement of Belg ium did not begin until short ly before446, an d then their advance under Chlodio was rapid and without pause forcolonization along th e route. We have no historical information to help us on

this point , but, on the whole, such a course of events seems unlikely. During thete n or fifteen years before 446 Aetius was occupied in preventing or controllingt he inroads of the Visigoths, Burgundians and Ripuarian Franks. The Saliansma y have seized their opportunity of moving from the inhospi table lands ofToxandria during this time, while Aetius's attention was directed elsewhere.The northern frontiers of Gaul always seem to h av e been r em ot e an d somewhatinaccessible and th e gradual movement and land-taking of the Salians in thisregion may not have concerned Aetius u n du ly -i nd ee d, i f th e land had beenbadly devastated in 407 he may have seen it as desirable, as a means ofrepopulatingth e area. The settlement of tribes of barbarians within th e empire was one ofhis policies. Possibly t he F ranks only became a danger to him, an d forced him

to take counter-measures, when they showed signs of wishing to cross th e Somme.In view of this, Frankish set tlements in Belgium before 446 ar e perfectly possible,and cemeteries such as Hai llot , Samson and Eprave in the Namur region ar emost credibly interpreted as belonging to ear ly S al ian F ra nk is h settlers, whoarrived perhaps as early as 430-40, and who were later given the status offederates.These people became the inheritors of th e surviving Gallo-Roman culture of th e

" 9 The account of this battle appears in Sidonius Apollinaris, Carmina, v, 2 1 0 ff The date 446 isthat given by Verlinden (1946). Gregory of Tours, Historia Francorum, II , 9, does no t mention th e battle,but records th e Frankish capture of C ambrai a bo ut this time.




Meuse valley, acquiring metalwork and glassware from th e Gallo-Roman factories,but evolving, as time wcnt on, fashions which ar e recognizably the earliest manifestat ions of a dist inct ive and new Frankish cul tu re .

The buckles of type II I B which interest us here ar e clearly a p ro du ct o f th etransition period. These were th e types of objects worn by th e first Frankish

settlers before they began to produce their own metalwork. The distributionsuggests that these buckles were popular. We find them, as we have seen, no tonly in th e areas of Salian occupation, but at Krefeld a nd R he ne n in RipuarianFrankish graves and also further to th e n or th i n the original German homelands.During th e time that th e Salians had been moving down into Gaul, the RipuarianFranks had occupied the valley of the lower Rhine about Cologne. Their materialculture in th e fifth century was almost ident ical with that of th e Salians, andwe find no t only th e II I B buckles but many other objects which can be exac tlyparalleled in th e cemeteries of th e Namur region. The best known of the burialgroups from Krefeld is that in th e warrior grave, no 43.rr° The dead man wasb ur ie d w it h a small buckle of type II I B, a strap-end very like that from th eHaillot grave described above, a spear, arrows and a sword. This sword had ascabbard w it h m ou th pi ec e w it h ovolo design and a ch ap e t er mi nat in g w it h t heupper part of a human figure with uprai sed arms. The little buckle finds itsclosest parallels at Samson,»: and t he s ca bb ar d c ha pe is almost identical withothers f rom Samson and Eprave.»>

All this is of great importance to us i f we ar e properly to understand th emeaning of our finds from England. As we have seen, th e large and simplebuckle of type II I B from Long Wittenham is very similar to the on e in grave I I

at Haillot. I t also resembles others from Tournai in Belgium, Bonn on the Rhine, II 3

a nd Rahm storf near Hamburg in north Germany.n - The little buckle from

Sarre is of much th e s ame size as those from Krefeld, grave 43, and its parallelsfrom Samson quoted above, but in its decoration it is more like o ne f ro m Hammein west Belgium, an d another fr om Ben A hin , near Namur.rc They could therefore have come to England from anyone of these regions, although t he l owerRhine or north Belgium seem the more likely sources.

We ca n no w turn to the s t rap-end found in an Anglo-Saxon grave at NorthLuffenham in R ut la nd (FIG. 24, a; type v B, I) , which is exactly paralleled byanother from Rhenen, grave 846.II6 T he Rhenen strap-end formed part of acomplex belt-set preserved in position on a portion of th e leather belt. The wholeset is in chip-carved work and is reminiscent of th e la te fourth-century belt-suits.But th e design of the s trap-end , with the t r iangular panel in th e centre of th e butt

and th e outward-facing hare-like creatures in th e corners, recalls even more

no Steeger (1937), pp. 182-B.i r r Werner (1953), pp. 41-2, pl. vii, 4 an d 5; Breuer an d Roosens (1957), pl. VI , 5.r r z Werner (1953), pl. vii, 3b an d 6-8." 3 Breuer an d Roosens (1957), pl. viii, I an d 5." 4 Werner (1958), pI. lxxxi, 3." ; Breuer an d Roosens (1957), pls, viii, 2, an d vii, I .

,, 6 Roes (1953), pp . 32 I f .. pl. ii; P. Glazema, Kunst en schoonheid uit de vroege Middeleeuwen (1955), pis.xiv-xv.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 39strongly the nearly ident ical design on th e plates of two highly decorated bucklesof typc II I B found at Samson.u> and these belong to th e first h al f o f the fifthcentury. The likelihood that th e Rhenen belt-set was made in th e same workshop isalmost certain because its four decorative ring-attachments also find their

closest parallel at Samson. II 8 I t is overwhelmingly probable that this workshopwas situated in th e Namur region. Thc North Luffenham strap-end , the twin ofth e Rhenen piece, was obviously made here too.

We can no w see that th e buckles of type II I B from Sarre and L on g Wi tt en -

ham and t he s tr ap -e nd from North Luffenham are examples of t he m et al wo rkthat was being produced in th e workshops of th e M eu se v al le y during th e firsthal fof th e fifth century. These workshops supplied both th e Sal ian Frankish settlersof Belgium and th e Ripuarian Franks of th e lower Rhine valley. Certain oftheir less exotic products, that is some of th e simpler II I B buckles, were alsotraded to th e Germans of th e north. We must no w consider from which of theseregions, and by what means, these three objects came to England. The fact thatthey were all found in Anglo-Saxon graves, and that nothing comparable tothem ha s turned up on late Roman sites, makes it certain that they we re c onnected with the Germanic settlement. The early date of the parallel materialon t he c on ti ne nt r en de rs it unlikely that they were traded goods. We are thusentitled to suggest that they were brought over by settlers as personal possessions.I t is just possible that th e tw o buckles came to Kent and Berkshire with theirwearers f rom Saxon homelands in north Germany. But buckles of this kind ar emore numerous in Belgium and th e lower Rhine district, and it seems more likelyt ha t o ur tw o came f rom somewhere here, as did the North Luffenham strap-end.They were not th e only objects to reach England from this region. In grave 42

in th e Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Abingdon, also in Berkshire, was found a swordwhose scabbard was furnished with a mouth-piece and chapeov exactly likethose from graves at Samson and Eprave and grave 43 at Krefeld Gellep (seeabove, p. 38). From Petersfinger in Wiltshire, grave 2 1 , ha s come a second swordwith such a scabbard mouthpiece.>v Both were certainly made in the workshopwhich produced the continental examples. According to Wemer.w' this workshopwas on e of those in th e N amur region which also manufactured the buckles of typeII I B. The swords ar e therefore part of th e same story: and th e story appears to bea Frankish one.

With th e sword in th e Petersfinger grave was an iron buckle, with its plated ec or at ed w it h t he early Frankish large-cell glass cloisonne work,»> and a battle

axe with symmetrically expanded cutting edge. I2 3 The latter is of a t yp e w hi ch isoccasionally found in ear ly Frankish graves, and there is an e xa ct p ar al le l ingrave 13 at Haillot.i« The Petersfinger grave was certainly that of a Frankish

" i Breuer an d Roosens ( 19 57 ), pl. vi, 2-3.,, 8 Roes (1953) , pis. v, 2 an d vii, 4." 9 Leeds an d Harden (1936), pp . 33, 59-60, pl. ix, b. c, d.r z n Leeds a nd S ho rt t (1953), pp . 16-17,53-4, pl. i.r zr Werner (1953) and (1956).n o Leeds an d Shortt (1953), pp . 17-3,49, pl. vi." 3 Ibid., pp . 18,54, pl. i i, fig. 6." 4 Breuer and Roosens (1957), fig. 15. 3.

4



M ED IE VA L A RC H AE OL O GY

warrior or his descendant, and this is also true of th e Abingdon grave. Therear e on e or two other objects in th e Abingdon cemetery which seem to be ofFrankish origin, including another of th e cloisonne buckle-plates.o- Frankishsettlers p rovide the most credible explanation of t he a rr ival of our buckles andstrap-end.

This is not th e place to examine all th e available evidence for early Frankishsettlement in England. The few graves and objects m entioned here have beenselected simply because they are most relevant to th e subject in hand. Butperhaps a few more words should be said before we leave th e subject entirely.The largest group of early Frankish metalwork from a single cemetery ha srecently been found at Lyminge in Kent. I26 Here there was clear indicat ion thata group of Franks settled on e site at some time around th e year 5 0 0 . Lymingeis exceptional. Most of our early Frankish finds ar e m or e scattered, in a wa y thatsuggests that the Fr ankish element was only a small part of th e whole. AtAbingdon, for example, there is early material of Saxon origin. The term AngloSaxon is perhaps misleading when applied to the settlements of southern England.

There is much to suggest that the popula tion was very mixed an d drawn frommany different regions of th e western and northern continent. I t ha s beensuggested before that many of th e Germanic settlers may have s ta rt ed out fromth e mouth of th e Rhine. Here, during th e unsettled years of th e migrations,peoples of many different rac ia l groups must have come together, and perhapsbanded together for th e crossing to E ng lan d, w it h much mixing of cultures.Whether they were Sal ians or Ripua ri ans, t he F ranks who crossed, bringing theirswords and buckles w it h t hem, most certainly came by this route, in t he ini ti alstages at an y r at e. T ho se who brought buckles of type II I B and the s t rap-end oftype v B mus t have been amongst the earliest arrivals.

CONCLUSIONS

In Britain, information about th e events of the late fourth and early fifthcentury has in the past been der ived a lmos t solely from literary sources, fromth e coin evidence which is limited in scope, and from the scanty results of excavations on th e sites of buildings. So fragmentary is such informat ion that manyregard the per iod in question as one of irremediable obscurity. Bu t not all sourceshave ye t be en t ap pe d. A most remarkable omission on our part is failure tolocate an d excavate late Roman cemeteries, and in particular t he mil it ary onesthat must exist. In this there has been a complete disregard of work done on th e

continent. In France, Belgium and Germany, much of what is known of thisperiod has come from cemeteries, and from th e study of objects that most frequent ly occur as grave-goods. Weapons an d small bronzes, for example, havebeen used to good effect, and hav e b ee n seen to fit into a historical pa t t e rn - apattern of a Romano-Germanic army, of Germanic laeti or foederati settled behindth e frontiers, and oftheir gradual replacement during th e fifth century by invading

115 Leeds a nd H ar de n (1936), p. 55, fig. 8.116 Warhurst (1955), pls, ix an d x.




bodies of free Germans. In this paper, I have appl ied similar methods to a series ofcorresponding bronze types found in Britain, and have tri ed to show, despitethe scat tered an d ill-documented state of th e material, that here , too, a h is toricalpattern ca n be discerned, mitigating something of th e previous obscurity.

Thus, in the first place, we have in th e eastern parts of Britain some authenticcont inental mil it ary metalwork, though in small amount. This seems to havebeen brought over for th e first time in the reign of Valentinian I by troopsfrom northern Gaul under the command of Count Theodosius. The soldiers

were probably Germans, an d they appear to have been based on the 'SaxonShore'. Secondly, we have in southern Britain, and more especially in th e west andth e midlands, two main classes of British-made versions of this foreign metalwork,which point by their distr ibution to a hitherto unsuspected military force, possiblya sort of yeomanry, based on th e towns. The long life of these buckles in th e fifthcentury suggests that th e force was maintained , perhaps wi th further recruitment of

German mercenaries, long after th e y ea r 410, when the British were empoweredto take measures for t he ir o wn defence. Last ly, a handful of further metalwork,of th e kind found on th e continent in very early Frankish graves, testifies to th epresence of some Franks in th e ini ti al phase of Anglo-Saxon set tl ement whichbegan in 443.

The buckles and belt-fittings, which have been the subject of this paper,ar e only a small proportion of th e mass of late Roman metalwork which liesunstudied in ou r museums. My purpose has been to show that such 'unconsideredtrifles', w hen bro ugh t together and considered systematically, can be madeto yield information that is new to us, bringing to th e passage between RomanBritain and Anglo-Saxon England light that we had not looked for.

CATALOGUET Y P E I A

Bronze buckles with sub-oval or D-shaped loop, and s t ra ight h inge-ba r cast inone piece with th e loop. The curved s ide is formed by the flattened bodies of a pairo f confronted dolphins, with a pellet b et we en t he ir o pe n jaws. The treatment of thesecreatures varies greatly f ro m bu ck le to buckle: on some they are executed in clearrelief with prominent, upstanding crests; on others they a re degenerat e and stylized,sometimes portrayed merely by scored lines on an otherwise plain loop. The majorityfall somewhere b et we en t he t wo e xt re me s. S ur fa ce decoration on th e loops takes th eform of punched dots, stamped ornament of some kind, or t ransverse grooving thatoften makes a collar around t he anima ls ' necks. Where th e buckle-plate survives i t isgenerally a long, narrow strip of sheet b ronze , doubled over th e hinge-bar of th e loopand riveted. Decorat ion, where it occurs, usually takes th e form of stamped ornamentand engraved geometric designs.

F ro m R om an SitesI . Caerwent. Mon.

N e wp or t M us eu m7.3, 19 06

L oo p o nly (FIG, 13,a): width 2 '5 crrr, A v er y R om an o- Br it is h town ofdegenera te example . Dolphins survive only as Venta Silurum. Circumnotched crests at sides, pellet as faceted knob stances of find no t known.at top, Tongue missing, hinge-bar damaged.



k

,\~

b

,I\,,

-,,'

....

_ - - - - - - - -

F IG . 1 3

Buckles of type 1 A, nos. 1 - 1 4 , 16 (pp. 21 IT., 41 IT.). Scv]

(a=I; b-c=5-6; d=2; e:f=7-8; g=I I ; h=S; i=IO,o ) = 9 ; k=16; 1=4; m =12 ; n =1 4; O=IS)



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 432.

3·

4·

5·

6.

7·

8.

9·

10.

Catterick, Yorks.In th e possession ofMr . E. J. W. IIildyard, by whose permission we publish it.

IIi ldyard (1957), p.246, fig. 6, I 3.

Chichester, Sussex.

We ar e indebted toMr.] ohn Holmes andMr. Alec Down forpermission to publishit.

Cirencester, Glos.

Corinium Museum,Cirencester.

Cripps Call. no. 291.

Cirencester, Glos.

British Museum,London.Reg. no. FL . 522.

Holbury, West Dean,Hants.Salisbury, South

Wilts. an d BlackmoreMuseum

..

London (City oj),Lothbury.London Museum.

Silchester, Hants.Reading Museum.B oo n ( 19 59 ), p. 80,pI. iii, A, 10 .

Silchester, Hants.Reading Museum.Boon (1959), p. 80,pI. iii, A, 6.

Silchester, Hants.Reading Museum.Boon (1959), p. 80,pI. i ii , A,S.

Complete example (FIG. 13, d) : width 3 ' 9 cm .Dolphins styl ized, 3 bands of moulding for jaws,cyes set high in knob-like protuberance at to pof hatched band. Tongue ha s rectangularp la te d ec or at ed w it h incised diagonal cross.Plate damaged; rectangular sheet of bronzewith 2 rivet holes.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 13, h) : width 2 ·8 em . Dolphinswith prominent , notched , crests, broad groovebetween jaws , circlet eyes, an d hatched collar

around necks. Sides of loop decorated withcrescent stamps. Tongue missing.

Loop and plate (FIG. 13, I): length 7 ' 5 cm .Dolphins with low, notched crests, triplemoulding for j aws , c i rc let eyes, collared necks.S id es of loop d ec or at ed w i th crescent s tamps.Tongue missing. Plate folded in half an driveted twice. Borders of crescents, th e outerforming a continuous ar ca de w it h dots atpoints of junction. Cluster of four crescents ince n tre; at e it her e nd irregular, lightly cross-hatched triangles.

Loop an d tongue (FIG. 13, b): width 2' 2 cm .Dolphins w ith prominent, notched crests.Heads simplified; eyes m is si ng . Tongue ofs im pl e t yp e with back folded over h inge-bar.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 13, c): width 3 em . Dolphinswithout crests, suggested by circlet eyes, crossedgrooves for pellet, an d stamped crescents at

sides of loop. Tongue missing.

Loop only (FIG. 13, e): width 4 cm . Dolphinswith low, notched crests, circlet eyes, and deepgrooves marking outline of jaws. Loopthickened at ends of hinge-bar an d decoratedat either side by circlet. Tongue missing.

Loop only (FIG. 13 , j ) : width 4 '4 cm . Stylizeddolphins with high, upstanding crests, hatchedvertically, and slight traces of eyes. Slightthickening ofloop at ends of hinge b a r. To ng u e

missing.Loop an d plate (FIG. I s.i» length 3 ' 8 em .Dolphins suggested by engraved lines an dnotching for cr ests , punched dots for eyes.Tongue missing. P la te u nd ec or at ed anddamaged.

Complete example (FIG. 13, i) : length 5 ' 7 cm .Dolphins suggested by engraved lines an dhatching for crests, collared necks. Platedamaged; decorative grooving on fold, andremains of border of repousse dots . Originally2 r iv et s at end.

Romano-British town ofCalaraetonium. 1952 excavations. Building I, roomI. Found on floor belowoccupation-level an d date d by s tr at if ie d c oi n tolate 4th or early 5thcentury.

R o ma n o- B ri ti sh t o wn ofNoviomagus Regnensium.Found during 1960 excavations at County Hallin to p of d ra i na g e d i tc hbeside Roman street, inlatest Roman level datedlate 4th or early 5t hcentury.

Romano-British town ofCorinium Dobunnorum.Circumstances of find no tknown.

As no . 4.

Romano-British villaAmong surface finds nearlate Roman building, to

g et h er w i th o t he r buckles,nos. II A, 8 an d II I A, 3, an dla te 4th -c ent ur y coins.Wilts. Archaeol. Mag., XIII

( 187 2) ,33,27 6.

Romano-British town ofLondinium. Chance find.

Romano-British town ofCallevaAtrebatum. Circumstances of find not known.

As no. 8.

As no. 8.



I

+a

rl

\::1 11

a

~I

FIG. 14Anglo-Saxon grave-groups from (a) Blewburton Hill, Berks. (grave 2) an d (b) Reading (grave 13)

containing buckles of type 1 A, nos. 15 an d 1 7 respectively (pp. 26, 4 5) . Sc. f, except as marked.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 45II .

12.

Upper Upham,Aldbourne, Wilts.Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.

Water Neioton, Hunts.PeterboroughMuseum.

Comple te example (FIG. 13, g): length 9 em .This differs from others in the series in that th ehinge-bar is a separate piece inser ted throughthe pierced terminals of loop. Dolphins stylized,with no crest s, circlet eyes, a nd b ro ad groovefor jaws. Second pair of styl ized heads ncarloop terminals. Tongue ha s stylized head at tip.P la te u nu su al ly long and n ar ro w, b or de r ofcross-tooled grooves and lines of stampedcrescents, d ow n c en tr e single line of runningscroll ornament, formed by linked, punchedrings. Plate damaged at edges, folded doubleand riveted at end.

Loop only (FIG. 13, m) : damaged, width 3 .6 em .Dolphins with vestigial crests, punched do t eyes,and large oval pe lle t between jaws. Hinge-barand tongue missing.

Romano-British village.Chance find.

Romano-British town ofDurobriuae. Circumstancesof find no t known.

From Anglo-Saxon Sites

13. Ash, Kent.Royal Museum,Canterbury.C. Roach Smith,Collectanea Antigua, II ,

pI. xxxvii , 8.

Loop only (FIG. 13,0): width 3.8 em. Dolphinswithout crests, p un ch ed d ot eyes, o va l p el le tbetween j aw s. S ty li ze d zoomorphic heads atends of hinge-bar. Scales suggested by furrowingof sides of loop. Tongue missing.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery.Circumstances of find no tknown.

14·

15·

16.

Beddingham Hill,Sussex.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1853, 4- 12,58.V.C.H. Sussex, I, 337.

Blewburton Hill,

Berks.Reading Museum.Berks. Archaeol.]., LIII

(I95 2-3),5 I ,fig.I9,5·

Broadway, Wares.Cook (1 958) , PI'. 62and 73, pI. xi, a,fig. 4, 2.

Reading, Berks.Reading Museum.] . Brit. Archaeol.

Assoc., L (1894), 150 If.

Loop only (FIG. 13, n): width 3 '4 cm. Stylizeddolphins with high, upstanding crests. Slightthickening ofloop at ends of hinge-bar. Tonguemissing.

Loop with i ron tongue (FIG. 14, a): width 3 em .

Dolphins stylized with vestigial crests andcirclet eyes. Sides of loop d ec or at ed w it htransverse grooves and stamped crescents.

Loop and tongue (FIG. 13, k) : width 2' 4 em .Dolphins with high, upstanding crests, headsstylized, open jaws and lozenge-shaped pellet .

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 14, b): width 2 '9 em . Dolphinswith low, notched crest, open j aw s, o va l p el le t,punched do t eyes. Tongue missing.

Barrow with Anglo-Saxonburial(s). Associations: 3disc brooches, and 2buckles of simple, earlytype.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,

grave 2, of woman. Associations: amber beads,applied brooch.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave I, of woman. Associations: glass beads,bronze an d silver wirerings, pair of cast bronzes au ce r- br oo ch es w i thwhirligig of legs design.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave 13. Assoc ia tions:bronze tubular object,

strap-end of early type,bronze and iron rings,Roman coin, an d po twith pedes ta l foot.

TYPE I E

Bronze buckles, basical ly s imi lar to those of type I A , on which the crests of th edolphins have been developed into outward -f ac ing horse-heads. These genera l ly haveclearly marked eyes, ears, and hatched manes. O n some examples t he d ol ph in headsare still distinguishable, with eye, jaw an d pellet, but on others th e horse-heads havebecome the main decorative feature and the dolphins have disappeared. Transitional



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 47stages in the development occur also. The plates associated with this type a re s imil arto those of r A.

From Roman SitesI. Alwalton, Hunts.

PeterboroughMuseum.V.G.H. Hunts., I,

24 3-9, fig. 7.Proc.Soc. Antiq., XXlII ,

4 13-4(wronglyprovenienccd) .

2 . Cirencester, Glos.Corinium Museum.Cirencester.

Loop only (FIC. 15, a): width 3 '3 cm . Fineexample, little w or n. D ol ph in s wcll definedwith triple moulding for jaws, do t eyes, transverscly grooved collars, sl ight thickenings thatmay reprcsent tails. Horse-heads c lear, open

jaws, punchcd eyes, an d notched manes. Onehas pair of grooves on nose t ha t m ay representpart of harness. Tongue missing.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 15, b): width 2·6 cm . Wornexample. Stylized dolphins with punched do teyes. Horse-heads clear, do t eyes, notched

Romano-British occupat ion site. Circumstances

of find no t known.

R om a no -B ri ti sh t ow n ofCorinium Dobunnorum. Circumstances of find no tknown.

3·

4·

5·

6.

7·

Cripps Col!. no. 231.

Cirencester, Glos.Corinium Museum,Cirencester.Cripps Col I. no. 234.

Clipsham, Rutland.Oakham SchoolMuseum.Reg. no. D.J. 69,A.L.T.

Dorchester, Oxon.Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.

Kirk and Leeds(1954), pp . 63 s.,fig. 27, no. 16, pI. iv,B.

Gestingihorpe(Hill Farm),Halstead, Essex.In possession of Mr.H. Cooper, by whosecourtesy we publishit.

Richborough, Kent.Richborough CastleMuseum.

manes. Line of crescents along junction of neckswi t h l oo p. Broken fragment of bronze tongue .

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 15, c): width 2 ' I ern. Devolvedexample

onwhich dolphins have disappeared

an d t he h or se -h ea ds b ec om e t wo featurelesslumps with circlet survivals of eyes. Sides ofloopdecorated with incised double zig-zag. Tonguemissing.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 15, d): width 2 ' 3 cm. Dolphinsstylized, t ri pl e m o ul d in g for jaws, prominentblobs for heads with circlet eyes, collarednecks. Horse-heads well m ou ld ed , o pe n jawsan d deep groove for manes. Running S-shapedscroll decoration at sides ofloop. Hinge-bar an dtongue missing.

C o mp l et e e x am p le (FIG. I, no. 16): length 3cm. Well -def ined dolphin-heads on loop withcirclet eyes an d mane, represented by line of

punched d ots. Sid es of loop cross-ha tched.Long rec tangular p la te secured to loop by projecting tabs, d o ub le d o v er hinge-bar and riveted. Secured to b el t b y tw o rivets at other end.Border of punched dots an d running S-shapedscrolls. Central decoration of t hr ee e ng ra ve droundels made of hatched outer ring withcentral dot, a l ternat ing wi th two cross-hatchedlozenges. Stamped crescents occur at corners oflozenges and sides of roundels.

L o op o nl y (FIG. 15, e): width 2·6 em. Dolphinss ty li zed, 3 bands of moulding for j aw s , t ri pl ec ol la rs at n ec ks . Horse-heads flat an d featureless except for notched name. Unfinished, withcasting ridges on ins ide. Little sign of wear.

Loop only (FIG. 15, f ) : width 2 ' 25 ern.Dolphins very stylized. Horse-heads clear,circlet eyes, notched manes. Hinge-bar an dtongue missing.

As no. 2.

Romano-British villa.Circumstances of find notknown.

From th e late Romancemetery outside walls ofRoman town of Dor

chester, grave 2, burial ofwoman, apparently of N.German culture. Associations: v ery ea rly typeof cruciform brooch, backplate of applied brooch.Fo r man's grave an dother burials see Kirk andLeeds (1954), pp . 63 fr.,an d a bo ve , p p . I ff.

Romano-British sett lement with late 4th toearly 5 th ce ntury occupation. Buckle found indestruction level of smallmasonry building of late4 th century date. Close bya ditch with late 4t h to5t h century coins, and latepottery. The site produced abundant evidenceof bronze-working, and,being unfin ished , th e object wa s p e rh ap s m a d e onsite.'Saxon-Shore' fort of Rutu-

piae. From latest levelsbut exact find-spot no trecorded.



b

cJ - ~~ - - ~ - - -

d

a

F I G . 1 6

a. Buckle of type 1 B, no. 14 (p. 49). bog. Othcr early Anglo-Saxon finds from th e same grave (no. 70 ) inthe Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Stratford-an-Avon, Warwicks, Sc. ]



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I T A I N 498.

g.

10 .

I I .

12 .

Richborough, Kent.Richborough CastleMuseum.Reg. no. 4477.

Spoonley Wood, Glos.Sudeley Castle.Antig.] . , XVII (1937),447, fig. b."7

Stanwick, Yorks.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 47, 2-8, 82.Smith (1923), p. 40,fig. 1 0 8 .

Tonnochy & Hawkes

(1931), pp . 12 3-8 .fig. 2.

Water Ncicton,Hunts.PeterboroughMuseum.

Water Neioton,Hunts.

PeterboroughMuseumReg. no. L. 340.55/4·

Loop only (FIG. 15, g): width 2 '25 cm .Dolphins have disappeared. Horse-headsmarked of f from loop by lines of billeting;circlet cycs an d l in es of triangular stamps formanes. Sides of loop decorated by tooling.Tongue missing.

Comple te cxample (FIG. 15, j) : width 2 ' 9 cm .Dolphins have d is a pp e ar ed . H or se -h ea ds w i thprominent ears, notched manes, do t eyes. Sidesof loop d ec or at ed b y groups of transversegrooves. S im pl e t on gue . S ma ll r ec ta ng ul arplate with para l le l grooves at base. Tongue andplate appear to have been replaced in antiquity.

Comple te example (FIG. 15, m): length 10 cm .Dolphins stylized, circlet eyes an d collarednecks. Horse-heads separated f rom loop by lineof stamped crescents; circlet eyes and tooledmanes. Sides of loop decorated by crescents.Tongue bronze. L on g r ec ta n gu la r p la t e foldedover hinge-bar to a third its length an d riveted.

Border of p ar al le l, t oo le d grooves; centraldecoration oflightly-engraved p a ir o f peacocks,back-turned, an d with small t ree be tween them.Extremely stylized. Birds' heads c ro wn ed b ycurious antennae, bodies divided into hatchedpanels, long tails represented by engraved linesan d supplementary d ot s, r in gs , an d crescents.Edges and en d of plate damaged.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 15, h): width 2· 8 cm . Wornexample; dolphins w i th w e ll -m ou ld e d heads,circlet eyes. Horse-heads much worn. Tonguemissing.

Loop only (FIG. 15, i ) : width 3' I e m. D ol ph in sflatly t re a te d , c ir cl et eyes. H o rs e -h e ad s w i th

notched manes and circlet eyes. Incised zig-zagdecoration on loop. Hinge-bar and tonguemissing.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. Surface find Il1

S W. s ect or of interior offort.

Romano-British villa. Circumstances of find no tknown.

Circumstances of find no tknown, but probably connected with Roman reoccupation of iron-agefortified site.

R om a no -B ri ti sh t o wn ofDurobriuae. Circumstancesof find no t known.

As no. 11 .


13. Bijrons,Patr ixbourne, Kent.Maids tone Museum.Baldwin Brown(1915), nr. pl. lxx, 6;Leeds (1936) , pl . xi i.

Loop and tongue (FIG. 15, k) : width 3 em . Aw or n e xa mp le . D ol ph in s w it h incised, slantingeyes. collared necks. Horse-heads div ided f romloop by l ines of punched dots, v er y w o rn .

A ngl o-Sa xo n c em et ery,grave associations unknown. In ConynghamCoIl., amongst materialfrom some of earliestgraves in cemetery. Seealso p. 59, II C, I.

14· Straiford-on-Auon.Warwicks.S tr at fo rd N ew Pla ceM U S e l U T I .

Complete example (FIG. 16, a): width 3 cm .Dolphin heads stylized, do t eyes. Horse-headsmoulded in rel ief, circlet eyes, grooved manes .Bronze tongue. Rectangular p la te ohscured bytextile remains.

A ngl o-Sa xo n c em et ery,grave 70, of woman.Associations : bronzestrap-end with silverp la ti ng , b ea ds , 3 bronzeneedles on ring, a nd p airof cruciform brooches(Aberg, class II) .

" 7 There is some doubt whether this is t he s am e b uc kl e w hi ch wa s found at Spoonley Wood an d wa spublished by J. H . M i dd le to n in th e Winchcombe and Sudeley Record, IV (1893), 39-48. I f it is, as se ems mostprobable since it is in t he S ud el ey Castle collection, we must assume that Middleton's drawing wa sinaccurate. The illustration (FIG. 15, j) is afte r Waterhouse in Antiq. ] . , loco cit.



Unknown Provenience15. Cambridge

University Museumof Archaeology an dEthnology.Reg. no. 83.53.2.


Loop only (FIG. 15, I): width 3 cm . Wornexample. Dolphins stylized. Horse-heads divide d f ro m l oo p by lincs of punched dots, muchw or n w it h punched ey e dots. Lines of dots a tsides of loop. Tongue an d hinge-bar missing.

TYPE I AlBBronze pla tes which belong to this type, no w detached from their buckles.

From Roman SitesI . Cirencester, Glos.

C o ri n iu m M u se um ,Cirencester.Bathurst Call.no. 376.

3·

4·

Duston, Northants,NorthamptonCentral Museum.

Popham,(College Wood),Hants.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1953, 7-9, I .

Bruce-Mitford (1954),pp . 75-6, pI. xvii, b.

Silchester, Hants.Reading Museum.Boon (1957), p. 80,fig. 9.B oo n ( 19 59 ), p. 80,pI. iv, A, I I .

Plate only (FIG. 15, n): length 7' 7 ern. Long rectangular plate, folded double, an d riveted:broken a t fold. A fine example w it h b or de r ofrunning S-shaped scrolls. Central design of ro wof 4 roundels, e a ch c om po se d of 2 concentriccircles around a central rosette which consists offour circlets an d central ring. Roundels l inked bydiagonal, incised crosses that f or m p ai rs of subtriangular panels filled with cross-hatching.Circlets a t either side of j un ct io n o f triangles,an d in e ac h c orn er of plate. L as t r ou nd el

masked by large rivet.Plate only (nG. 15, 0): length 7 .8 cm . Longrectangualr plate, folded double and riveted.F in e e xa mp le w it h d ou bl e border of runningS-shaped scrolls. Central design of threeroundels composed of 2 concentric, hatchedcircles around a four-pe ta l marguer i te , withcentral ring an d dotted petals. Similardetached petals as fill-up in field. At tw oends, adjacent to outer roundels, ar e crosshatched triangles, and in spaces betweenth e roundels cross-hatched rectangles. Betweenrectangles an d roundels, on each side, groups of3 spotted petals, and o n r em ai ni ng sides ofrectang les c rescen t s tamps . Dome-headed r ive tpie rces cen tra l roundel, an d two others at en dof plate.

Plate only (FIG. 15, p) : length 5 ' 4 c m. R ec tangular plate folded double an d riveted a t end.Border of cross-tooled grooves. Central decoration of t hr e e e n gr a ve d cross-hatched lozengeswith pair of punched rings a t each angle.

F ra gm e nt o f plate (FIG. 15, q) : length 3 ' I cm .Surviving portion probably half th e original,and e nd s ha pe d to fit buckle. Outer border,ro w of crescent s tamps; inner, crosses in incisedframe. Central decoration of 2 (originally 3 or

4) roundels composed of 2 concentric circleswith crescent s tamps between , around a crosswith c i rc let s tamps in th e angles. Broken roundel, pierced by r iv et -h ol e. B et we en s u rv iv in groundels a pair of cross-hatched triangles withcirclets a t angles, and, between them an d th eth e rounde ls . t ransverse rows of hatched ovals.

R o ma n o- Br it is h t o wn ofCorinium Dobunnorum. Circumstances of find no tknown.

Romano-British village.Circumstances of find no tknown.

Romano-Br it i sh bui ld ing .Surface find.

R o ma no -B ri ti sh t ow n ofCalleva Atrebatum. Circumstances of find no t known.

TYPE II A

Bronze buckles made up of separate loop, tongue, and p la te , h el d t og et he r by abolt. The loop is formed by a pair of confronted dolphins, similar in type, decoration,and in varying degree of stylization, to those on buckles of type I A, but with tails making




involuted terminals. The tongue, w hi ch r ar el y survives, has an e xp an de d b ac k an ddown-curling projections at th e sides that interlock with th e loop terminals . At th ebottom of t he t on gu e an d th e two loop terminals ar e pierced cylindrical attachmentsthat fit into others (normally 4 in number) at the top of t he p la te . They ar e usuallydecoratively grooved, and ar e locked together by a long pi n or bolt, which securesloop, tongue an d plate together. The plate itself is normally decorated by an openworkarcade design usually consist ing of three or four rectangular openings with piercedcircles at to p an d bottom, or of some variant of this. Sometimes there is some form ofedge decoration. Almost invar iably there ar e rivets or rivet-holes at e ac h c or ne r of th eplate. Surface decoration on the plate, and sometimes on the tongue and loop too, takesth e form of punched dots or circlets.

From Roman SitesI. Caerwent, Mon.

N e wp o rt M u se um .

Caerwent, Mon.Newport Museum.

Plate and loop fragment (FIG. 17, a): max.length 4.6 e m. L oo p t er mi na ls still held in pos ition by hinge-bar. Tongue missing. Plate piercedby 2 round-headed arches. Ornamental excrescences at bottom and sides. Surface decoration

of circlets.

Fragment of loop (FIG. 17, b): max. width 4 ' 3em . Stylized dolphins with ears instead of crests,oval depress ion for pellet, p un ch ed d ot eyes.One terminal broken . tongue missing.

R o ma n o- Br it is h t ow n ofVenia Silurum. Circumstances of find no t known.

As no. I .

3·

6.

Caistor-by-Norwich,Norfolk.This, an d no. 4, ar ein th e possession ofProfessor Donald Atkinson, by whose permission we publishthem.

Caistor-by-Nonoich,Norfolk.

Chedioorth,Yanworth, Glos.ChedworthVil la M u se um .Reg. no. 83. B.

Colchester, Essex.Colchester and EssexMuseum.

Fragment ofloop (FIG. 17, c). Stylized dolphinwith no crest , incised line marking jaw. circleteye, and triple-collared neck.

P la te o nl y (FIG. 17. g): length 4 ' 5 em . Piercedby eight openwork arches whose roundedheads a re partly d iv id ed o ff b y o rn am en ta lp ro je ct io ns f ro m th e intervening pi l lars- infour o pp os ed p ai rs w it h t he r ou nd ed heads atto p and bot tom. Decora tive notch ing at bottoman d sides. Rivet-holes in corners. Hinge components grooved. One, broken in antiquity,

was replaced by a patch, grooved to match.

Lo op on ly (FIG. 17, d) : width 3 ' 3 e rn , Cleardolphins wi th open jaws , lozenge-shaped pellet.circlet eyes. an d notched manes. Tonguemissing.

Complete example \FIG. 17, e): length 6 em .Dolphins well-executed, with prominent notched jaws. round pellet, circlet eyes. Tongue ha sstylized animal head at ti p and at ends of curledside-pieces. L a rg e c ir cl et at base. Hinge components grooved. Plate pierced by 4 rectangles

R o ma no -B ri ti sh t ow n ofVenia Ieenorum. 1930 exca

vations, Building 4, destroyed by fire. Dismembered an d unburied humanrem-iins associated withTheodosian coins suggestd es tr uc ti on a ft er 40 0 bySaxon raiders. This and

no. 4 were on th e latestoccupation level in th eroom next to tha t cont ai ni ng t he corpses.] . Rom. Stud., XXI (1931),232-3; Arehaeol. .T, CV I

(1949).65,

As no. 3.

Romano-British villa.Surface find to east ofbuildings in o ut er c ou rtof vil la .

Romano- British town ofCamulodunum. Circumstances of find no t known.



7·

8.

9·

1 0 .

II .

12.

Duston, Northants.NorthamptonCentral Museum.

Hotbury, West Dean,Hants,Salisbury, SouthWilts. and BlackmoreMuseum.

Leicester.Leicester Museum.Reg. no. 3 I . 195 I .

Leicester.(.Jewry Wall),Leicester Museum.Reg. no . .l.W. 84·5.Kenyon (1948), p.256, fig. 84, no. 5.

Lullingstone, Kent.In th e possession ofLt.-Col. G. W.Meates, by whose

permission we publish it.

Lydney Park, Glos.Wheeler (1932), p.86, fig. 101.


with circles a t to p an d bottom. Bands ofdiagonal hatching at to p a nd b ot to m of plate,and ornamental excrescences at base. Rivet-holesin each corner. Surface decoration of puncheddots and circlets on all parts of buckle an dplate.

Fragment of loop (FIG. I 7 , f ) : max. width 3 .8e m. D ol phi ns stylized with cars in place ofcrests, s em i- ci rc u la r o p en in g s under jaws,leaving square pellet, p un ch ed d o t eyes. Oneterminal broken, stylized head with circlet ey eat ti p of other. Tongue missing.

Plate only (FIG. 17, h): width 3 cm . Crudeexample wi th triple arcade in which th e piercedrectangles and roundels have been run together. Irregular notching at base. Rivet-holesat corners, i ro n i nc ru st at io n. Hinge attachm en t s b ro k en .

Fragment of loop (FIG. 17, i) : max. width 5 ern.Well executed dolphin wi th hatched crest, openjaws, round pellet, circlet eye. O ne h al f of loopbroken off, tongue missing.

P la te o nl y (FIG. 17, I): length 4 '7 cm . Triplea r ca d e s im il ar to no. 6. Transverse grooves a tbase an d ornamental excrescences at base andsides. Rivet-holes at corners. Surface decorationof circlets. Hinge components grooved.

Loop only (FIG. I7,j): width 2·8 em. Dolphinsstylized with prominent crests, lozenge-shapedpellet, o val eyes, and collared necks. O net e rm i na l b ro ke n, t on gu e missing.

Loop and tongue (FIG. 17, k): width 3 em .D ol ph in s w i th ear-like crests. Back of tonguepierced. Hinge-bar and two hinge-componentsfrom plate surviving.

Romano-British village.Circumstance of find no tknown.

Romano-British villa. A-

mong surface finds ncarlate Roman building together wi th nos. I A, 6 andII I A, 3 an d late 4t h century coins. Wilts. Archaeol,Mag., XIII (1872), 33, 276 .

Romano-British town ofRataeCoritanorum. Circumstances of find no t known.

Romano-British town ofRatae Coritanorum. Fromdisturbed levels whichproduced other late Roman finds, an d t he s tr a pend, type v A , 2.

Romano-British villa.From th e latest occupat io n al d eb r is s ea li ng Bathblock furnace which went

out of use c. 380. Thislevel contained tw o coinsof Va l ens (364-378).

Late Romano-British temple. From originalmake-up of cella floor,dated (b y coins) after364-7.

Lydney Park, Glos.Wheeler (1932), pl.xxviii, 1 3 0 .

P la te w it h fragments of loop an d tongue (F IG .

18, a): length of plate 4 ' 9 em . Plate with unusual o p en w or k d ec or at io n, consisting of aro ug h c en tra l ro un de l flanked by i rregularrectangles. At th e bottom three rectangles, atth e t o p c ur vi li ne a r p a tt e rn s . Ornamental projections at bottom an d sides, n otc hin g o n thehinge-components. Rivet-holes in th e corners.

Latetemple.Exactknown.

Romano- Bri tish1805 excavations.

find-spot no t

North Wraxall, Wilts.Devizes Museum.Reg. no. 399.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 18, b) : width 4 ' 4 em . Dolphinswith hatched crests, open jaws, rectangularpellet, do t eyes. Stylized head a t e nd o f terminal.One terminal and tongue missing.

Romano-British villa.Exact find-spot no tknown, bu t certainly froma late level. Vi ll a c a me toviolent en d in late 4t hce n tury (corpses an db ro k en m a so n ry in well).Wilts. Archaeol. Mag., VI I

(1862),59-75·



/I

I

\ ; " ' : ~ ' ,' .... _- -_ ..../ ':

- ,/ \

/ ",/ / - - - ' d

I

/IIII\\.,-, , ,

..... _-- . r r :

I _II ~ -

f

k

e

a

/ / - ' .._-"'''''," "- - - - - ,

/ / / ......... , '/ I \

I II I

I II II I

FIG. 17

Buckles of type II A, nos. 1 - 1 2 (pp. 21 fl., 51 If.). Scv](a-c=I-3; d-j=5-7; g=4; h-i=8-9;j-k=cIl-I2; I=IO)



54~

//

I

//

A R C H A E O L O G YEDIEVAL

- ,-," 1 \

I \\ \

\ I /\ ' ..... - "" I

\ /-, /

..... .., ,.,.

I I

b LJ

FIG. I S I f 51 ff.). Sc. i- I , 2 1 - 2 4 (pp .. 21 0" _0 )e II A, nos. 13 9 _ 8-

1 9 ;l - k = ~ 2-4uckles of ty p . f ~ ~2 I ; g-h ._. I

(a-e= I ,-I?,



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I T A I N 55


16.

17·

18.

19·

20.

2 1 .

:22.

Old Sorum, Wilts.Salisbury, SouthWilts. an d BlackmoreMuseum.R eg . n o. 05/A8.Archaeol.]. , CI V

(1947), 136 (publisbcd as medieval).

St. Albans, Herts.VerulamiumMuseum.

Archaeologia, LXXXIV

(1934), 259, fig. 12,16.

Sea Mills, Bristol.Bristol City Museum.We ar e indebted toMr. G. C. Boon fordrawing ou r a ttention to th is p iece .

Silchester, Hants.Reading Museum.Bo on ( 19 59 ), p. 80,pI. iii, A, 9.

Water Newton, Hunts.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1882,6-21,69·

Douer, Kent.(Buckland estate) .British Museum,London.We a re i nd eb te d toMiss V. 1. Evison forpermission to includet hi s in advance of he rf o rt hc o mi n g e xc av ation report.

Mitcham, Surrcy.CambridgeUniversity !VIuseumof Archaeology an dEthnology .Morris (1959), pp .10 2-3 , pI. x ii i, 38.

Sarre, Thanet, Kcnt.Maids tone Museum.Archaeol. Caniiana, VI

( 1864),174.

Plate only (FIG. 18, c): length 3' 7 em. Eccentricexample with o nly two attachments for loop,and long tongue-like projection at bottom.Threc key-ha le -shaped openings with circleabove.

Loop only (FIG. 18, d) : width 2·8 em. Dolphinswith small crests, open jaws, lozenge-shapedpellet, circlet eyes. Sides of loop have puncheddot decoration. Tongue missing.

Plate only (FIG. 18, e): length 4 ' 7 ern. Originally of doubled sheet-bronze, th e folded en d cutto form th e four grooved hinge-components:i ro n b ol t in position still r e ta i ni n g p o rt i on ofbronze tongue. Openwork decoration consists ofvariant of triple arcade: rectangles with arches

a t either en d partially divided off. Incised linesan d cross-tooling around each opening. Backpar t s ub s eq ue nt ly b ro ke n, an d r epai re d b yinsertion of sheet of b ro n ze b et w ee n th e tw ohalves of pla te and secured by four rivets. Veryworn.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 18, g) : width 3 ' 2 e rn . Dolphinswith lo w notched crests, open j aws, c i rc let onpellet, circlet eyes. Tongue missing.

L o op o n ly (FIG. 18, h): width 2 ' 4 cm. Dolphinswithout crests, circlet eyes, collared necks. Onet er mi na l b ro ke n, t on gu e missing.

Loop w it h i ro n tongue. Dolphins very stylized,s ur v iv in g o n ly as hatched crests a t sides, andrec tangular protuberances for heads. Tonguema y perhaps be a later replacement.

Loop only (FIG. 18,! ) : width 4 ' 4 ern. Dolphinswithout crests, open jaws, lozenge-shapedpellet with hollow cent re, circlet eyes, collar offive rows of slashes round necks. Similar slasheson terminals and stylized, open-jawed heads.Tongue missing.

Plate only (FIG. 18, i) : length 4 '3 ern. Threesub-rectangular openings w it h h ea rt -s ha pe dpiercings a t either end. Decorative notching atbottom. One side broken.

Romano-British settlement of Soruiodunum. Circumstances of find no tknown.

Romano-British town ofVerulamium. From late4 th c en tu ry filling of th e

Theatre.

Romano-Br it i sh por t.Chance find.

R o ma n o- Br it is h t ow n ofCalleva Atrebatum. Circumstances of find not known.

R o ma n o- Br it is h t ow n ofDurobrivae. Circumstancesof find no t known.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave 48, of woman.Associations: saucerbrooch with five-spiraldecoration, buttonbrooch, beads , and knife.

A ng lo -S axo n c em et ery,grave 38. Associations:bronze finger-ring.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave 94. Associations:silver-gilt c i rc u la r b ro o chwith central garnet andnielloed border, fragmentsof gold braid, miscellaneous objects, iron knifean d key, beads o f a mb eran d glass.

5



II

I I'_J

a


Ii' IIII,~ J

cFIG. 19

a-b. Buckles of type II B, nos. 1 - 2 ; cod. Buckles of type II C, nos. 1- 2 (pp. 34, 57 f.). Sc. }

,,,

a b

FIG. 19 bis

a. Fragment of buckle-plate, type II A, no. 25; b. Buckle, type II I B, no. 3 (p ost sc ri pt , p. 68). Sc. t



f

FIG. 2 0

a-f. Buckles of type II I A , nos. 1,3-7 (pp. IO ff., 59 f.). ( a=I ; b=4; c= 3 ; d=6; e= 5 ; 1=7)·g-h. Buckles of type II I n, nos. 1 -2 (pp. 34 ff., 60). Sc.}



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S I N B R I TA I N 59version of the II A form. The edges of the loop are decorated with panels of billeting,and there ar e simplified scrolls on the involuted terminals and on th e tongue.

From Anglo-Saxon SitesI. Bifrons,

Patrixbournc,Kent.Maidstone Museum.Baldwin Brown(1915), III, pI. lxx, 9;Leeds (1936), pl. xii,

2. High Down, Sussex.Worthing Museum.Reg. no. 3436.Archaeologia, LI V

(1895),377, pI. xxvii,5·

Loop only (FIG. 19, c): width 3 '9 em . Examplc

with well-executed animal-heads, with ears an dopen jaws . Rather worn.

Loop an d tongue (FIG. 19, d) : width 3.8 em .Example with stylized animal heads. Ratherworn.

A ng lo- Sa xo n c em et ery,

grave associations un -known. In ConynghamcoIl., material from someof earliest graves in cemetery. See also p. 49,1 B, 13 .

An glo -S ax on c em ete ry,grave 26, of woman.Associations: pair ofbronze bow-brooches,annular brooch, and ironring.

TYPE II I A

Bronze buckles with semi-circular loops terminating in open-jawed animal heads

confronted across th e hinge-bars. The loop may be plain or decorated with chip-carvedwork, and incised o r s ta mp ed designs. The heads vary in degree of naturalism as onth e o the r buckle types. but they a re i nt en de d to represent some so rt of quadruped'shead, perhaps lion or leopard. The plates may be cast or cut from sheet metal, foldeddou bl e ove r th e h in ge -b ar of th e loops, and are semi-circular or a broad rectangle inform. Most a re p la in except for some kind of edge decoration.

From Roman SitesI . Bradwell, Essex.

Colchester andEssex Museum.

2. Dorchester, axon.(Dyke Hills).Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.Kirk an d Leeds(1954), pp . 63 ff., fig.27, I, pl. iv, A.

3. Holbury, West Dean,Wilts.Salisbury, SouthWilts. an d BlackmoreMuseum.

4. Richborough, Kent.RichboroughCast le Museum.Bushe-Fox (1949), pl.xxx ii , no. 67.

Loop only (FIG. 20, a): width 6· 5 cm . Loopplain , heads stylized bu t clear. Tongue missing.

Complete example (FIG. I , no. I) : length 7' 2cm. Loop plain and w or n, h ea ds s ty li ze d an dindistinct, circlet eyes. Tongue curved at tip,bevelled edges and transverse grooves at back.Plate semi-circular with border of ovolo decorat ion, 3 r ivet s; repaired in antiquity wi th patch .

Complete example (FIG. 20, c): width 4 ' 2 em .Loop ha s grooved surface an d notched edge,heads stylized. Plate rectangular, p lain bu t forserrated edge, 2 r ivet s.

L oo p o nl y (FIG. 20, b): width 6· 2 em. Loopp la in , h ea ds stylized. Tongue missing.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofOthona. Unstratified find.Site has yielded h ig h p roportion of la te 4th centurycoins and a few 5th-6thcentury Anglo-Saxon ob

jects. Cf. Report o f theColchester and Essex Museum

April I947-Mareh 1948,pp . 25-28, pl. ix, 1-2.Late Roman cemeteryoutside walls of Romantown of Dorchester, graveI, burial of man. Associations: strap-end (see p.63, no. v A , I) , 3 discattachments (see p. 66,nos. VI, 2-4), metal platesfrom sporran (see p. 66,no. VII, I) , bone toggleand metal plates.

Romano-British villa.Among surface finds nearlate Roman building, together w i th o t he r buckles,I A , 6 an d II A , 8, pp . 43,52, and late 4t h centurycoins. Wilts. Archaeol,Mag., XIII (1872),33,276.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. From middlelayer of inner stone-fortditch, in association withcoins up to house ofTheodosius.



605· Richborough, Ken t.

RichboroughCastle Museum.Bushc-Fox (1949),1'1.xxxii, no. 68.

M E D IE V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

Loop only (FIG. 2 0 , e): width 5 ' 9 cm . Loop As no . 4.plain. Heads with c le ar ly d ef in ed cars an deyes an d punched dots along jaws. Tonguemissing.

Chance Finds

6. Icklingham, Suffolk.Moyses HallMuseum, Bury St.Edmunds.

Exact find-spot no tknown. Perhaps from th eRoman villa or th e AngloSaxon cemetery onMitchell's Hill.

7· Oxford.Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.

C o mp le te e x am p le (FIG. 2 0 , d); length 7 em .Well -execu ted heads with circlet eyes. Edgeof loop decorated by band of diagonal tooling,uppcr surface by arcade design of contiguouscrescentic stamps with dots a t points ofjunction. Tongue waisted, w i th c u rv e d ti p an dr e ct a ng u la r p a ne l on b ac k d ec or at ed w it h 3transverse grooves. Plate folded double an droughly c ut , p la in , with 3 rivets.

Loop an d tongue (FIG. 20,1) : width 6 ern. Loopworn, crouching animals in chip-carved workstill visible around edges, circlet stamps onuppcr surface, well -execu ted heads . Tonguewaisted w it h c u rv e d ti p an d rec tangular pane lon back.

Circumstancesunknown.

of find

8. Unknownprovenience, Kent.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1942, 10-7,5·

Comple te example (P L. I , A ) ; width I I' 7 ern.A finc example in 'chip-carved' work. The loopha s clear animal-head terminals, a border oftriangles, and on the upper surface a panel ofgeometric motives l ike s ing le arms of swastikas.T he re ar e tw o tongues with stylized animalheads at th e tip, which ar e linked across th eback by a transverse bar decorated with proj e ct in g a n im a l- he a ds ; a cross-within-trianglemotive at th e base of each tongue, and astamped circlet between. The plate ha s a millededge, an d a c en tr al p an el of swastikas andtriangles, bordered by a line of annulets. 2rivets.

Apparently found withth e attachment-plate (I"68, V I I , S ) and discattachments (I'. 66, VI ,

12- 13) .

TYPE II I B

Bronze buckles of similar form to type III A , but with p la tes cas t in on e piece withth e loops.

From Anglo-Saxon SitesJ. Long Wittenham,

Berks.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 47, 2-8, 82.Archaeologia, XXXVJJJ

(1860) 333,pl.xix, 1 0 .

Comple te example (FIG. 20, g) : width 7' 2 ern.L oo p p la in with well-executed animal heads,eyes oval. Rectangular plate with billetedborder an d vertical grooving at top. Two rivets.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave 57, of woman.Associations: pottery ja rwith bossed and stampeddecoration.

2. Sarre, Thanet, Kent.Maids tone Museum.

C om p le te m i ru at ur e example (FIG. 2 0 , h) :width 3 cm . Well-executed animal heads withcirclet eyes. P la te r ec ta ng ul ar , w it h n ot ch ededges and tw o rivets. Circlet stamps on loopan d upper par t of plate.

Anglo-Saxon cemetery.G r av e n ot known.

TYPE IV A

Bronze buckles with loops basically of type III A , but attached inside one- or twopiece rectangular plates, which are decorated with 'chip-carved' ornament and h av e o netubular side decorated with ribbing.



S O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B RI T AI N 61

FIG. 21

Buckle, type IV A, no. I , from Richborough, Kent (p. 62). Sc.

FIG. 2 2

Buckle, type IV B, no. I , from Catterick, Yorks. (p. 62). Sc.J



From Roman SitesI . Richborough, Kent.

Liverpool Museum.Reg. no. M.6g62.Roach Smith (1850),pl. v, fig. 2.

Snodland, Kent.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1928,5-1 I , I.

Antiq. J., VII (1927),522 ff.

Chance Finds3. Smithfield, London.

British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1856, 7-1,147 0.Smith (1923), fig. 4.

4a. Unknownprovenience, butperhaps from Kent.Liverpool Museum.Reg. no. M.6922.

4b-d. As no. 4a.Liverpool Museum.Reg. nos. M.691669 21.

M E D IE V A L A R C H A E O L O G Y

C o mp le t c e xc ep t for tongue (F IG . 2 r } : max.length 5 ' 4 cm . Loop with well-executed animalheads , cas t in f ixed position inside the one-piecep la te . T h is is decorated at on c cn d with a pairof stylizcd confronted animals with back-turnedheads. The remaining surfaces ar e occupied bycrude geometric 'chip-carving'. The loop an d

tubular en d a re b ot h or na men te d with aninc ised z ig-zag pattern with punched rings inth e angles. Rivet-holes in corners of plate.

Broken half of one-piece(?) plate (PL. II B) :max. width 7 em . I t contains th e oval aperturefor the missing buckle, and is decorated in semiclassical s tyle with tooled roundels containingengraved human busts on a background ofniello. Between th e roundels ar e 'chip-carved'scrolls. The plate is bordered by a line of bronzesquares, in reserve against a nielloed field, eachdecorated by a circle of punched dots. Rivetholes in corners.

C o mp le t e e x am p le (PL. II A) : max. length 9 ' 5cm . Loop, with stylized animal heads, an dplain tongue, both swivel on hinge-attachments.One-piece plate enclosed in beaded frame an ddecorated by arrangements of coarse 'chipcarved' scrolls, paired or enclosed in beadedtriangles an d lozenges. Rivet-holes in corners.

Comple te example , with two-piece plate (PL.III A) : m ax . l en gt h 8· 7 cm. Loop, with wellexecuted animal-heads, an d tongue, both swivelon hinge-attachments. 'Chip-carved' decoration of running S-shaped scrolls on on e h alf o fplate, and scroll-rosettes within roundels on th eother. Rivet-holes in corners.

Se t of three belt-plates (PL. III, B-D), two triangular an d o ne r ec t an g ul ar, which accompanied th e buckle. Decoration of scroll andgeometric patterns. Rivet-holes in corners.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. Unstratified.

Found near a Romanstructure on site of Snodland gas-works.

Circumstances of find

unknown.

T Y P E IV B

Bronze loop bas ical ly of type III A , set in openwork frame.

From Roman SiteI . Catterick, Yorks.

Recent lyacqui red byt he B ri ti sh M u se um ,London.Hildyard (1957), pp .243 f., fig. 6, 12,pl. ix.

C o mp le te e x am p le (FIG. 22): width 9 .6 em .Semi-circular loop with open- jawed heads , confronted at ends of h in g e- ba r, w h ic h h a ve l argecirclet eyes, ears, an d hatched manes. Tonguewith stylized a n im a l h ea d a t tip. Loop enclosedon three sides in an ornamental frame or platepartially separated from it by openwork panels.This plate consists of a roughly straight bar,attached to centre of curved side of loop, whichis decorated by ornamenta l notching in chip

carved style on itsouter edge and by stampedcirclets, large an d small, o n u pp er surface. Tw oopenwork roundels on either side of where tip oftongue rests served as means of attachment tobelt. At either side of loop, and joined to th ebar of t he p la te , are realistic d ol ph in s w i thopen- jawed heads and circlet eyes, f la t bel lies ,tapering backs, out-curved tails, an d surfacedecoration of punched dots.

R o ma n o- Br it is h t ow n aCataractonium. 1952 excavations. Building I, Room I.

O n floor below occupation level, dated (b ys tr at if ie d c oi n) late 4thor 5t h century. Samel ev el as b uc kl e n o. I A, 2 ,

P·43·




T Y P E V A

Strap-ends with pear-shaped front an d splayed, square-ended, split butt, in to whichth e belt end was inserted and then secured by one or more rivets. The ornament varies.Some are decorated in 'chip-carved' work with scrolls and marginal animals, others bystamped decoration. Many are plain.

From Roman SitesI . Dorchester, axon.

Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.Kirk & Leeds (1954),p. 66, pl. iv, A, fig.27, 11 .

2.

3·

4·

5·

6.

Leicester(Jewry Wall site).Leicester Museum.Reg. no.J .W. 84.15.Kenyon (1948), p.255, fig. 84, 15·

A1 lton-nextSittingbourne, Kent.Maidstone Museum.

Richborough, Kent.RichboroughCast le Museum.Reg. no. 335.Bushe Fox (1928),pI. xxi, 48.

Richborough, Kent.RichboroughCastle Museum.Reg. no. 1631.Bushe Fox (1949),pl. liii, 207.

Richborough, Kent.RichboroughCastle Museum.Reg. no. 4647.

(FIG. I , no. 11 ) : length 5' I em. Butt slightlybevelled, with 2 rivets. Pair of incised groovesdivide off pear-shaped front.

(FIG. 23, a): length 7 em. Tw o rivets. Incisedgroove marks off pear-shaped front which isdecorated in chip-carved work. Inside a doublegrooved frame is a des ign of seven spiral scrolls,3 in triangular cluster at top, an d 4, downwardcurling, in pairs at bottom. On lower ed ge s apair of stylized, crouching, marginal animals.

(FIG. 2, a): length I I' 5 em., bu t front damaged.Tw o r ivets on b ut t . P la in except for transversemoulding between butt an d front.

(FIG. 23, e): length 3' 9 cm., tip broken. Singlerivet in butt, which has notched edges an dsurface decoration of roughly scored lines. Onfront , a 'chip-carved' design ofa single S-shapedsc ro ll enc losed in a too led f rame.

(FIG. 23, d) : butt only, width 2' 5 em. 2 rivets.Decorated in centre with crudely 'chip-carved'seven-pointed star ins ide a grooved an d tooledframe. Edges notched.

(FIG. 23, b): butt missmg, length 4 ' 5 em.Decorated d ow n c en tr e with 3 l arge c ir cl etstamps, border and one transverse band ofpellet within triangle stamps, an d three more ofthese stamps in line up f ro m t ip .

Late Roman burials,grave 1, of man. Associations: zoomorphic buckle

(p. 59, no. III A, 2), discattachments (p. 66, no.V I, 2-4), metal plates (p.66, no. VII, I ) , bonetoggle, misc. bronzeplates.

R om an o- Br it is h t ow n ofRatae Coritanorum. Fromdisturbed levels, whichprod uced other late

Roman finds an d th ebuc kle s (p. 52, nos. II A ,

9 an d 10).

Circumstances of find no tknown. Probably fromlate Roman burial. Associated with 2 disc-attachments (p. 66, no. V I, 5-6)an d 2 attachment-plates(p. 68, nos. VII, 2-3).

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. From disturbedlevels.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. From inne r d it chof stone fort at depth of5 ft. in filling; layer containing Theodosian coins.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRuiupiae. Details of findno t known.


7. Cassington, axon.Purwell Farm site.Ashmolean Museum,Oxford.Oxoniensia, V II (1942),65-6, fig. 15, pl. v, c.

(FIG. 23, f ) : length 6 em. Tw o r ivet-holes inb ut t. P la in e xc ept for incised grooves at junction of butt an d front.

A ng lo -S ax on c em et er y,grave 2 , of woman. Reused as charm or keepsake. Threaded on wirering with 2 bone discs an dbronze tag , an d placed inpurse that also contained2 boar tusks an d a fragment of glass. Otherassociations : pair ofsaucer brooches with 5spiral decoration, amberan d crystal beads, an d aknife.



" II .. ' I

II

I

IIb

- - - - - - - - /\\ .\ 1 /

\\\

e

" 9

,,I,,,

I

FIG. 23 6 If·) SC. 1( 1 0 If., 3 .. 1f e V A, nos. 2, 4- 1 0pp . . ~ O ' h=9)Strap-ends a t y ~- 8 ' d=5; e=4; !=7 , g -I ,

(a=2; b=6, c -,



S O L D I E R S AND S E T T L E R S IN B R I TA I N

b

a

FIG. 24a. Strap-end, type v B, no. I (pp. 38 f., 63).

b-g. Disc-attachments of type VI , nos. I , 7-1 I (p. 66). (b=I,o c-d=7-8,o e-j= IO-II,o g=9) .h. Attachment-plate, type VII, no. 4 (p. 68). Sc. f



68 M E D I E VA L A R C H A E O L O G Y

Milton-nextSittingbourne, Kent.Maids tonc Museum.

(FIG. 2, d an d e): matching pair with border ofincised running-spiral decoration along edgesof plates.

Circumstances of find no tknown. Probably fromlate Roman burial. Associations: strap-end (p.63 , no. v A , 3:), diseattachments (p. 66, no . VI,5- 6).

+ Richborough,Kent.RiehboroughCastle Museum.Reg. no. 2793.

(Fl(;. 24, h): a one-piece imitation in sheetbronze of th e more u su al co mp osit e fo rm.Decorated by 3 inscribed circlets enclosed inpanels with border of tooling in herring-bonepattern.

'Saxon-Shore' fort ofRutupiae. From middlelayer of out er dit ch ofstone fort, a level whichproduced many Theodosian coins .

Chance Finds

5. Unknownprovenience, Kent.British Museum,London.Reg. no. 1942, 10-7,5·

(PL. I, D): fine example in 'chip-carved' workwith milled edges. In th e centre ar e th ree squarepanels filled with a composite pelta design, andaround them is a border of running tendrilledscrolls.

Apparently found withth e fine chip-carvedbuckle (p. 60 , no. III A ,

8) and th e disc-a ttaehments (p. 66, nos. VI,12- 1 3 ) .

Anglo-Saxon cemetery,grave 8, of a woman.Associations: pair ofbronze disc brooches withengraved circles an dstamped decoration. Antiq. ] . , VIII (1928), pI.xxvii, 1-2 .

Fragment of plate only (FIG. 19 bis). I t mayoriginally h a ve b e en d e co ra t ed w it h t hr ee o pe nwork rectangles with roundels at to p andbottom.

Tongue missing (FIG. 19 bis): width 5 ' 7 em .Loop plain with well-executed animal heads

with oval eyes an d c ol la re d n ec ks ; decoratedwith tooling. Rectangular p la te w it h groovedan d tooled border, tw o rows of stamped circlets,an d vert ica l grooving a t top. Two i ro n rivets.

POSTSCRIPT

After this p ap er h ad gone to press two more buckles were discovered:Type II A25. Luton, Beds.

Luton Museum,Reg. no. L/50/33'Antiq. ] . , VIII(1928), 187, pI.xxxii,8.

TypeIIIB3. Unknown

provenience bu t

probably Kent.Royal Museum,Canterbury.Reg. no. 2187.

The Luton buckle-pla te adds one more to th e already numerous group of type II A

buckles. I t was buried in worn and broken condition in a cemetery which has producedother very ear ly mater ia l.

The Canterbury Museum buckle is th e third known example of th e type II I B

buckle found in this country. Presumably it came from an Anglo-Saxon cemetery.Like t he o ther two, it is in origin a continental piece, and most resembles examples fromTongres (Belgium) an d Mainz (Germany).128

BIBLIOGRAPHYAlfoldi, A. (1934) 'Eine spat romische Helmform un d ihre Schicksale im Germanisehe-Romanisehen

Mittelalter,' Acta Archaeologica, v (1934), 99 If.Baldwin Brown, G. (1915) The Arts in Early England (1915)'Behrens, G. (1919) 'Germanisehe Kriegergraber de r 4. bis 7. Jahrhunderts in Stadtischen Altertums-

museum zu Mainz, ' Mainzer Zeitschrijt, XIV (1919), 3 ff.--- (1930) 'Spatrornische Kerbschnit tschnallen, ' Schumacher Festschrift (1930), ppo 285 ff.Bequet, A, (1877) 'L a forteresse de Furfooz ,' Annqles Soc. archeol. Namur, XIV (1877), 399 ff.--- (1891) 'Les cimetieres de la forteresse d'Eprave-La Croix Rouge,' Annales Soc. archeol, Namur, XIX

(1891),435 ff.

128 Breuer and Roosens (1957), ppo 321-2 , pis. vii, 4-5 and vii i, 40



69O L D I E R S A N D S E T T L E R S IN B R I TA I N

Boon, G. C. (1957) Roman Silchester (1957)·- - ~ (1959) 'Thc latest objects from Silchester, Hants., ' Med. Archaeol., II I (1959), 79 fT.

Boulanger, C. (1905) Le Mobilierfuneraire gallo-romain etfranc en Picardie et en Artois (1905).Breuer, J. , an d Roosens , H. (1957) 'L e Cimetiere f ran c de Haillot,' Archaeologica Belgica, XXXIV (1957)·

(Extrait dcs Annales Soc. archeol. Namur, XLVIII (1956), 171 ff.).Bruce-Mitford, R. L. S. (1954) 'A late or sub-Roman buckle-plate from College Wood near Winchester,'

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in the fifth century A . D . , ' Archaeologia, XCVIII (1961), 29 ff.Cachet,]. B. D. (1864) La Normandiesouterraine (1854)'Cook, Jean M. (1953) 'A n Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Broadway Hill , Broadway, Worcestershire,' Antiq.

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XVII-XVIII (1954), 63 ff.Lantier, R. (1948) 'U n cimetiere du IV e siecle au "Mont-Ange" (Vert-Ia Gravelle, Marne),' L'Antiquite

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- - - ,

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(1959),51 ff.Nenquin,J. (1953) La Necropole deFurfoo z (Soc. archeol. Namur, 1953).O'Neil, B. H. St. John (1944) 'The Silchester region in th e 5th an d 6th centuries A . D . , ' Antiquity, XVIII

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7° M E D I E VA L A R C H A E O L O G Y

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Wheeler, R. E. M. , a nd T.V. (1932) Report on the excavation o f the Prehistoric, Roman, and post-Roman site illLydney Park, Gloucestershire (Res. Rept. Soc. Antiq. Lond., IX , 1932).

ACK:"OWLEDGEMENTS

Th e br ing ing toge ther for drawing an d study of so many widely dispersed objects has only beenachieved with th e kindly cooperation of th e many museums an d individuals whose names a pp e ar i n th eCatalogue. We offer them ou r gratitude an d appreciation of all th e trouble they h av e t ak en on ourbehalf. We should also like to thank Professor Donald Atkinson, Mr . George Boon, th e late D r. P hi li pCorder, Mr . C ha rl es G re en , M r. Jack L in ds ay, M r. P. Storer P eb er dy, M r. J . N. Taylor an d Mr . HughThompson, all of whom gave us information or answered queries . We a re i nd eb te d to Hi s G ra ce t heDuke of Wellington for permission to publish t he m at er ia l from Silchester, an d to th e Rt . Hon. theViscount Bledisloe, Q.c., for kindly allowing the use of t h e m at er ia l from Lydney Park.

With the exceptionof

FIGS. I ,

3-4, 6-7, 9and I I ,

allt he d ra wi ng s used

in thispaper ar e

by MissElizabeth Meikle (now Mrs. Fry-Stone).

Anglo Saxon Graves

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Transcript of Anglo Saxon Graves