Early Medieval Art and Archaeology in the Northern World Studies in Honour of James Graham-Campbell Edited by Andrew Reynolds and Leslie Webster LEIDEN • BOSTON 2013 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 CONTENTS Foreword ........................................................................................................ David M. Wilson Preface ............................................................................................................. List of Contributors ..................................................................................... List of Illustrations ....................................................................................... James A. Graham-Campbell—A Bibliography 1968–2011 Compiled by Martin Comey ................................................................... xi xv xvii xxi xxxix OBJECTS Hanging Basins and the Wine-Coloured Sea: The Wider Context of Early Medieval Hanging Bowls ...................................................... Noël Adams 3 The Wilton Cross Coin Pendant: Numismatic Aspects and Implications .............................................................................................. Marion M. Archibald 51 A Lost Pendant Cross from Near Catterick Bridge, Yorkshire ....... Rosemary Cramp Gabatae Saxiscae: Saxon Bowls in the Churches of Rome during the Eighth and Ninth Centuries ......................................................... Richard Gem ‘All Shapes and Sizes’: Anglo-Saxon Knives c. 700–1100 ................... Patrick Ottaway 73 87 111 A Remarkable Anglo-Saxon Gold Finger-Ring from Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire .......................................................................... Leslie Webster 139 An Anglo-Saxon Bone Acanthus-Leaf Mount from Malmesbury Abbey, Wiltshire ...................................................................................... David A. Hinton 153 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 vi contents Hybridity and Identity in Early Medieval Wales: An Enamelled Class G Brooch from Goodwick, Pembrokeshire ............................. Ewan Campbell 163 Ring Rattle on Swift Steeds: Equestrian Equipment from Early Medieval Wales .......................................................................................... Mark Redknap 177 Viking and Late Norse Ceramic Baking Plates in the Hebrides ....... Alan Lane 211 A Gold Finger-Ring Found Near Tipperary, Ireland ............................ Niamh Whitijield 231 The Insular Comb ........................................................................................... Ian Riddler and Nicola Trzaska-Nartowski 259 Two Ninth-Century Pails from Ireland .................................................... Martin G. Comey 275 Weights and Weight Systems in Viking Age Ireland ........................... Patrick F. Wallace 301 A Medieval Sword and Scabbard from the River Bann ...................... Cormac Bourke 317 Some Viking Weapons in Sigvatr’s Verse ................................................ Judith Jesch 341 An Anglo-Saxon Disc-Brooch From Sjørring, Jutland .......................... Raghnall Ó Floinn 359 Two Viking Age Pendants from Iceland .................................................. Guðrún Sveinbjarnardóttir 371 Medieval Bronze Bowls from North Norway and Their Context: Sámi or Norse? .......................................................................... Ingegerd Holand 383 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 contents An Important Late Merovingian or Early Carolingian Sword in the Yorkshire Museum ............................................................................. Barry Ager vii 409 HOARDS A Casket Fit for a West Saxon Courtier? The Plumpton Hoard and Its Place in the Minor Arts of Late Saxon England ................ Gabor Thomas 425 The ‘Northern Hoards’ Revisited: Hoards and Silver Economy in the Northern Danelaw in the Early Tenth Century ........................ Gareth Williams 459 Cuerdale: An Update from North-West England .................................. B.J.N. Edwards 487 The Context of the 1858 Skaill Hoard ....................................................... David Grifijiths 501 The Silver Hoard from Skovvang, Bornholm .......................................... Birgitta Hårdh 527 Treasure—A View from the South ............................................................ Wendy Davies 541 PLACES Anglo-Saxon Civil Defence in the Localities: A Case Study of the Avebury Region .......................................................................................... Andrew Reynolds and Stuart Brookes 561 The Liberty of Sandwich, Kent, c. 1300 and Its Implications for Earlier Topography .................................................................................... Helen Clarke 607 A Viking Burial at Balnakeil, Sutherland ................................................. Colleen E. Batey and Caroline Paterson 631 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 viii contents Early Finds of Viking Graves in the Isle of Man .................................... David M. Wilson 663 Viking Age Agriculture in Ireland and Its Settlement Context ........ Mick Monk 685 The Reliability of the Alleged Early Lough Gara Iron ......................... Barry Raftery 719 Viking Brittany: Revisiting the Colony that Failed ............................... Neil Price 731 Saxons, Britons and Scots: Pilgrims, Travellers and Exiles on the Continent ..................................................................................................... Mark A. Handley 743 STYLE, SYMBOL AND MEANING William Nicolson’s Drawing of the Main Text of the Bewcastle Cross ............................................................................................................... R.I. Page 781 ‘Little Men’ and the Missing Link: Irish Anthropomorphic Vessel Mounts .......................................................................................................... Susan Youngs 789 Viking Raiding, Gift-Exchange and Insular Metalwork in Norway .......................................................................................................... John Sheehan 809 Copying and Creativity in Early Viking Ornament .............................. Signe Horn Fuglesang Finds of Treasure and Their Interpretation with Special Reference to Some Hoards Found in Birka and on Björkö ............................... Birgit Arrhenius King Harald’s Rune-Stone in Jelling: Methods and Messages ........... Else Roesdahl 825 843 859 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 contents A Note on the Beard-Pulling Motif: A Meeting between East and West, or a Northern Import? .................................................................. Alison Stones Old English ‘Wopes Hring’ and the Old Norse Myth of Baldr .......... Richard North ix 877 893 END PIECES Endnote .............................................................................................................. Negley Harte Index ................................................................................................................... 913 917 © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 AN IMPORTANT LATE MEROVINGIAN OR EARLY CAROLINGIAN SWORD IN THE YORKSHIRE MUSEUM Barry Ager A sword with elaborately inlaid hilt ijittings and a pattern-welded blade was recently acquired by the Yorkshire Museum (Figures 1 and 2; accession no. YM 2000.4280). As far as is known, it has no precise, recorded ijindspot, but it is possibly from Yorkshire, as it was found in “the attics of a country house” in the area of the pre-1974 county.1 Surviving patches of the original surfaces of the blade suggest it may have been recovered from a waterlogged deposit or river-bed. It is a highly important piece, both because the form and elaborate decoration of the hilt are almost unique, and it appears to date from a transitional phase in the development of early medieval swords, for which there is only limited surviving evidence. Description The sword (surviving length: 754mm) has a hilt with straight, narrow upper and lower guards and a high, hump-backed pommel with stepped shoulders, below which the edges are gently concave; height 25mm (including basal wire). The components of the hilt are all basically of solid iron. The guards have keeled sides and triangular ends; lengths, 98mm (lower), and 85mm (upper); height, 8mm. They are each inlaid with yellow, leaded tin bronze in ijive rectangular plates alternating with triple vertical strips of the same alloy separated by groups of vertical grooves (see abstract of British Museum Research Laboratory report by M. Cowell below; gold was not detected, although the Royal Armouries report mentions traces of original gilding). Three of the rectangles are missing, where close, ijine, vertical grooves are visible in the underlying iron for keying the inlays. Between the strips there are dark, shallow, vertical grooves about 1mm wide. They are arranged in four groups of four, with groups of three at the ends of the lower guard and one, or possibly two, grooves obscured 1 Hartley 2001: 31, no. 48. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 410 barry ager Figure 1. The Yorkshire Museum sword. Courtesy: Trustees of the British Museum. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 411 Figure 2. Hilt of the Yorkshire Museum sword. Courtesy: Trustees of the British Museum. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 412 barry ager by wear at each end of the upper guard. The grooves appear black now, but microscopic examination during conservation work, undertaken after the initial surface analysis for the report, indicates that this is due to magnetite from the underlying iron of the guards and not to the residue of any metal or mineral inlay as was ijirst very tentatively proposed.2 In two of the black lines, towards one end of the lower guard, there are possible traces of vertical rows, each of three small light-coloured rings, that may have been inlaid in the grooves, but they were too small to detect, or to identify any difference of material in the analysis. Very small patches of a red deposit on the guards are probably incidental. The pommel has a flat, rectangular section (7mm thick in the centre), tapering to a point at each end, and is only marginally shorter than the upper guard. It is ijinely decorated on both sides with an inlaid, diagonal lattice work of wires of copper-based alloy, grey in colour, enclosing small circles, all of the same material as on the guards and hammered into grooves and punched circles in the surfaces (analysis at the British Museum suggests there is a slight possibility that the wires are silver plated, or perhaps tin plated). Areas of the lattice have been damaged by corrosion on one side of the pommel. The pattern continues over the top edges of the pommel, where the lozenges are compressed laterally. Round the base of the pommel, separating it from the upper guard, runs a reddish copper wire, 2mm thick, which has the appearance of being twisted. This is only a visual effect, however, created by diagonal grooves incised in the wire. There are traces of mercury gilding in the recesses of the wire where it has been protected from wear.3 Measured between the guards, the grip is 98mm long and 5mm thick. Two small areas of mineralised horn on the tang indicate that the grip was probably horn and the outlines of its ends preserved on the inner faces of the guards suggest that it was oval in section, approximately 45mm wide at the top and 50mm at the bottom.4 It may originally have been concave sided, as on some examples of Behmer’s types VII and VIII.5 The blade is double edged and somewhat corroded, without any obvious sign of a fuller; both the tip and sections of the edges are missing; width, 50–53mm maximum (below guard). The central section along the 2 Personal communication Michael Cowell, London; British Museum Conservation Report no. 2002/19/M/6 by Hayley Bullock. 3 Ibid. 4 Ibid. 5 Behmer 1939, Taf. 55, 1 and 59, 1. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 413 Figure 3. X-radiograph showing detail of inlaid loop. By permission of the Trustees of the Royal Armouries. length of the surviving blade is pattern welded in three layers; there is a relatively simple, herringbone pattern visible on both sides of it (see below) and the plain core can be seen in a couple of places where corrosion has stripped away the outer, patterned layers. X-radiography by Alison Draper has revealed that about 75mm below the hilt, and invisible to the naked eye, there is an inlaid maker’s mark overlying the herringbone on one or other side (Figure 3).6 It is in the form of a pattern-welded, tear-shaped loop, and fugitive traces continuing beyond its ends suggest that it may be one half of an original ijigure-of-eight loop, or perhaps an ‘eyelet’ shape (see discussion below). The edges of the blade are formed by a plain strip about 10mm wide, presumably of steel, butt welded round the central section. Voids in the blade were ijilled during conservation to give it support. 6 Royal Armouries, Leeds, X-radiograph no. 35/00. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 414 barry ager There is an area of mineral-preserved traces of the lengthwise grain, probably of a wooden scabbard-plate, on one side of the blade. Very small patches of a yellow material on the blade are probably incidental. Discussion The stepped pommel of the Yorkshire Museum sword apparently represents a development of the solid, hump-backed iron forms common on swords of the late Merovingian period from the mid-seventh to eighth centuries, which are frequently inlaid with linear and geometric patterns in silver wire.7 The comparatively increased height of the pommel of the sword from Férebrianges (Marne) suggests a typologically intermediate form, while it is also notable that the lower guard is closely inlaid with vertical wires (Figure 4; Musée d’Archéologie Nationale, inventory no. 68051–1). Furthermore, the somewhat irregular chequered pattern on one side of the pommel (with a more typical stepped cross on the other) illustrates decorative experimentation that appears to culminate in the design of the lozenge grid on the Yorkshire Museum sword. As a further example of this intermediate form, I am most grateful to Mme Françoise Vallet, not only for providing me with slides and details of the Férebrianges sword just mentioned, but also for drawing my attention to the publication of an unprovenanced sword in the Museum für Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Berlin, which has a high, silver-inlaid pommel with more pronounced shoulders and central hump, although it does not yet approach the size and sharpness of outline of the pommel belonging to the subject of the present article.8 The Anglo-Saxon version of shouldered pommels with prominent, arched, central elements of the middle and later eighth century from Windsor and Chiswick Eyot may represent an independent, parallel development from earlier seaxes in England, e.g. from Oliver’s Battery near Winchester, and the construction, especially of Windsor, is rather different from the continental form.9 A simple lozenge grid pattern is inlaid in brass in the central section on one side of the pommel of a late Merovingian sword from Büraburg (Hessen), dating to around ad 650–680.10 7 8 9 10 Behmer 1939, Taf. 57–61; Menghin 1983: 321–324. Menghin 1994: 223, no. 133. Webster & Backhouse 1991: 225–226, cat. nos. 180–181; Andrew & Smith 1931, ijig. 2. Stiegemann & Wemhoff 1999: 279–280, no. V.17. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 415 Figure 4. Hilt of a Merovingian sword from Férebrianges (Marne). Courtesy: Musée d’Archéologie Nationale. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 416 barry ager The closest parallel to the Yorkshire Museum’s sword known to the author is provided by the sword from an early boat grave at Ultuna, Uppland, Sweden.11 This sword, although provided with a pommel of exceptionally large size with corrugated shoulders and small, knobbed terminals, has both the straight guard inlaid with rectangular plates and the sharply shouldered outline to the pommel of the Yorkshire Museum sword and is similarly inlaid with a lattice pattern, in this case of silver wires enclosing stepped swastika motifs. The Ultuna sword is not a Viking product, but it represents a developed example of Behmer’s broad-bladed, mainly late Merovingian type VIII (triangular pommel variant), the chief area of distribution of which lies in southern and Western Germany, Eastern France and Switzerland, with only stray examples occurring outside the region.12 The type is Frankish, originating in the ijirst half of the sixth century, and was adopted in Burgundian and Alamannic areas in the seventh, possibly lasting into the ijirst half of the eighth. John Ljungkvist suggests a probable dating to the later part of the seventh century for Ultuna,13 but the absence of any trace of zoomorphic terminals on the pommel of the Yorkshire Museum sword and the keeled section of its guards suggest the latter is typologically later (see below). Both swords are, nevertheless, clearly related technically by the form and style of decoration of their pommels, although the blade of the latter is too narrow to include it in the same type VIII, and they must represent late Frankish ‘exports’ to Northern Europe from the Continent. The same would apply to a third sword with the high, stepped pommel, but lacking the distinctive lozenge grid decoration, found in a river near Askeaton, Co. Limerick, Ireland, and dated to the eighth century by Peirce.14 The guards of the Yorkshire Museum sword are long and narrow, but are no longer of the common ‘sandwich’ construction between thin, riveted, upper and lower plates that are usual on swords of type VIII and may be compared with transitional, pre-Viking swords of Petersen’s Type A.15 In certain respects, the sword is also closer to early Carolingian, mostly late eighth or early ninth-century examples, including the ‘Mannheim’ type, which likewise have solid iron guards inlaid with vertical strips, or wires closely hammered into ijine grooves to give the impression of plating 11 12 13 14 15 Behmer 1939: 183, Taf. 61,1. Behmer 1939: 186–189, 204–205. In letter, 29/1/2001. Peirce & Oakeshott 2002: 28–29. Behmer 1939, Taf. 57–61; Petersen 1919, ijig. 52. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 417 the whole surface, e.g. from Gravråk, Norway, and Hedeby/Haithabu, Nordloher Tief and Mannheim, Germany.16 Although its pommel is typologically earlier, the straight, keel-sided form of the Yorkshire Museum guards and the style of inlay are closely comparable with the swords from the Rhine at Speyer and Lembeck, Germany, which similarly have guards inlaid with vertical metal strips of brass, and median strips of the same metal, too, on the latter.17 The hilt-ijittings of the Lembeck sword are inlaid with small metal rings, as were, possibly, the guards of the Yorkshire Museum’s sword, for which a broadly eighth-century dating seems most appropriate in the light of the above comparisons. A remarkable parallel for the pattern of the Ultuna pommel is provided by a sword of unrecorded ijindspot in a private collection. It has a pattern of stepped swastikas in lozenges inlaid in yellow metal on the pommel and in silver lozenges between double chevrons of yellow metal on the guards (Figure 5). Its straight guards and triangular pommel are features of Petersen’s later type I of the latter half of the ninth until the mid-tenth century, and most examples have been found in Scandinavia.18 But, like the swords of the Yorkshire Museum-Ultuna-Askeaton group, this is probably another type that was ‘imported’ from the Continent, in spite of imperial edicts forbidding such trade, since Frankish-made swords, particularly those from the Rhineland, were highly prized by the Vikings.19 A further, unprovenanced sword of the same type was sold recently at Christie’s and is currently on loan to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.20 Its pommel is also inlaid with stepped swastikas, although of silver, while those on the guards are set in squares between groups of vertical lines, and, signiijicantly, the blade is faintly inscribed along the fuller with what appears to be the name HARTOLFR. The name would appear to be the same as the HARTOIFA inscribed on the top of the silverinlaid lower guard of a ninth-century sword from the Viking cemetery at Kilmainham, Co. Dublin. In the latter inscription the ijinal letter was originally read when still discernible as ‘A’, but subsequently interpreted as ‘R’ by Professor Marstrander, and the ‘I’ is apparently a blunder, unless 16 Müller-Wille 1982, Abb. 8–10; Arrhenius 1982, Abb. 4; Geibig 1999: 35, Taf. 1; Westphal 2002: 142–144, Abb. 1.2.45, and 1.3.31. 17 Dunning and Evison 1961, pl. 34c–d, ijigs. 3, 7; Stiegemann & Wemhoff 1999: 289, V.37; Westphal 2002, Abb. 1.1.18a–b. 18 Petersen 1919: 101–105. 19 Müller-Wille 1982; Solberg 1991. 20 King Street, London, sale of 16th December 2003, lot 119; MMA loan no. L.2008.29.2; Williams 2009: 141, ijigs. 124-125. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 418 barry ager Figure 5. Hilt of an unprovenanced Viking-period sword in a private collection. Courtesy: Enzo Calabresi-von Morenberg. it is a lower case ‘l’, thus yielding HARTOLFR.21 The names are a further demonstration that these swords were the products of a Frankish smith or workshop.22 They possibly intimate, too, that both hilts and blades could have been forged in the same workshop, if not by the same smith. It might be suggested that the superijicial Scandinavian impression created by the ijinal ‘R’ is perhaps an indication either that the workshop catered for a Scandinavian clientele or that the smith was of Scandinavian extraction. The stepped swastika motif that features in the decoration of the hiltijittings of the ijirst unprovenanced sword, deijining it as one of a stylistically linked group with the Ultuna and unprovenanced HARTOLFR examples, occurs along with the plain variant in both continental Germanic and Anglo-Saxon ornamentation. It has been traced back to late Roman metalwork, and appears later, too, in Insular manuscripts, e.g. in the Lindisfarne Gospels, where it is used as a space ijiller in the upper case ‘A’ on 21 Coffey & Armstrong 1910, pl. 4, 5; Peirce & Oakeshott 2002: 66–67. 22 Müller-Wille 1982: 144–145. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 419 fol. 91.23 It is therefore noteworthy that one such manuscript, produced in Northumbria and incorporating stepped swastikas in the borders of the frontispiece (fol. 1), viz. the early eighth-century ‘Collectio Canonum’, was known to be in Cologne in the same century.24 Although that date is too late to suggest the possibility of Anglo-Saxon influence on, or reinforcement of, the choice of the design in the case of the Ultuna sword, it is tempting to raise it in connection with the other two members of the stylistic group and postulate that the motif may have been combined, perhaps in the Rhineland, with the pre-existing type of plain lozenge grid noted above, speciijically for the decoration of sword-hilt ijittings. More evidence would be needed, though, to determine whether the group might represent the output of a single, or closely connected, workshop(s) keeping up with technical development and fashion over time. The herringbone (or chevron) pattern welding of the blade of the Yorkshire Museum sword is of Lang and Ager’s type A.25 This is a common pattern in use throughout much of the early medieval period and was employed on both single and, less often, double-layered blades, e.g. on Merovingian swords from Schretzheim, Germany, graves 166, 324, 556, 630; sixth and early seventh-century Anglo-Saxon examples from Dover graves 71, 93, 96A, 96B, and Chartham Down, Kent; as well as on late ninth-century Anglo-Saxon swords of Petersen’s type L from London and ‘Ardvonrig’ (Ardvouray?), Barra, Scotland.26 It was noted above that the blade is inlaid with a pattern-welded loop (Figure 3). Simple, inlaid loops occur from the sixth century onwards on pattern-welded blades, replacing plain rings, e.g. the ijigure-of-eight loops on a Merovingian sword from Schretzheim, grave 511 and on a Petersen type L sword from Camphill, Burneston, Yorkshire.27 Eyelet-loops occur on a seventh-century Merovingian sword from Andernach, Germany, grave 1940, on eighth-century swords from Leer-Ostendorf and Dülmen, and on tenth-century, late Saxon, and late ninth/early tenth-century Viking swords from the Thames near Westminster, and the River Lea at Edmonton, Enijield.28 Such loops and scrolls also occur on the typologically later blades of homogeneous iron. They are probably makers’, or 23 Brown 1981; Backhouse 1981, pl. 39. 24 Alexander 1978: 44–45, cat. no. 13, ill. 60. 25 Lang & Ager 1989, ijig. 7.2. 26 Koch 1977, Taf. 182, 3, 6, 11–13; Lang & Ager 1989: 95, ijig. 7.5c. 27 Koch 1977, Taf. 185, 3; Lang & Ager 1989, ijig. 7.10b. 28 Oesterwind & Schäfer 1988, Abb. 14, 4; Westphal 2002: 158–159, Abb. 1.1.27a–d and 1.1.28a–c; Lang & Ager 1989, ijig. 7.9a–b. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 420 barry ager workshop, marks, and the precursors of the well-known ULFBERHT and INGELRII inscriptions on swords of the Viking/Carolingian periods from the late eighth/early ninth century and later, although on these it is often only the letters that are pattern-welded, while the blades may be of homogeneous iron.29 Since the ijind circumstances of the Yorkshire Museum sword are unrecorded, its earlier history is a matter for speculation. It was perhaps a royal gift from the Continent to a member of the Northumbrian elite or else the weapon of a Viking in the Great Army, if it was indeed found in Yorkshire. But the signs on the blade that it may have been retrieved from a waterlogged, or riverine, source indicate that it could be a further example of what appears to have been a deliberate rite of water deposition of weapons that was widespread among Germanic peoples during the ijirst millennium ad, and in Britain particularly from the late Saxon/ Viking period.30 It has also been suggested that swords were deposited in rivers at ceremonies of peace making, or oath taking.31 Other possibilities should not be dismissed, however, as a certain proportion must doubtless represent loss in battle at river crossings and bridges, or even occasional accidental loss from scabbards, e.g. by riders getting into difijiculty while fording, which is not unheard of. In conclusion, the shouldered form of the pommel of the Yorkshire Museum sword is shared with swords of the late seventh/eighth century from Ultuna and Askeaton, while its lozenge grid decoration indicates in addition a stylistic connection with the former and also with the typologically and chronologically later, unprovenanced HARTOLFR sword and the example noted in a private collection. It is of eighth-century Frankish manufacture and sheds light on a so far little-attested intermediate stage in development from swords with high, geometrically inlaid pommels and straight guards of solid iron of the late Merovingian period to Carolingian/ Viking-period examples of Petersen’s type I of the late ninth/mid-tenth century, with fully weighted, triangular pommels inlaid with lozenge grids and similar guards. 29 Lang & Ager 1989: 101–106; Westphal 2002: 154, 159. 30 Müller-Wille 1984; East, Larkin & Winsor 1985: 3–6; Lang & Ager 1989: 114; Härke 2000: 389–390; Theuws & Alkemade 2000: 426; cf. Simek 1993, sub ‘Slíðr’. 31 Blair 1994: 99. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 an important late merovingian or early carolingian sword 421 Abstract of Report on Examination of the Sword Undertaken by Michael Cowell in the British Museum’s Department of Scientiijic Research; DSR Project No. 7193 The iron sword is of late Merovingian or early Carolingian date (eighth century ad). Inlaid decoration on the guards and pommel on the handle of the sword was analysed by qualitative X-ray fluorescence (XRF) to attempt to identify the materials used. The yellow metal on the sword handle is leaded tin bronze. The grey cross bands on the guard could not be fully identiijied; they may be a completely corroded copper alloy or the residue of a mineral inlay such as niello. The twisted wire decoration is copper. The lattice pattern on the pommel consists of a copper alloy and there is a possibility that it is silver or tin plated. Acknowledgements I am most grateful to Elizabeth Hartley, former Senior Curator of Archaeology at the Yorkshire Museum, for asking me to write this note and for kindly making the sword available for study. I am also indebted to Hayley Bullock and Michael Cowell for their respective scientiijic reports, to David Thickett and Kathryn Hallett for analysis, and to Alison Draper and David Starley of the Royal Armouries for the x-radiography and rescanning. Similarly I wish to thank John Ljungkvist (Institutionen för Arkeologi och Antik Historia, Uppsala), Martin Rundkvist and Jan-Peder Lamm for information regarding the Ultuna excavations, and Per Brorson for his kind and invaluable assistance. I am further indebted to Françoise Vallet and Dr Patrick Périn (Musée d’Archéologie Nationale, France) for slides, illustrations and information regarding the sword from Férebrianges, and ijinally to the Department of Conservation, Documentation and Science and British Museum Photographic Services for photographs of the Yorkshire Museum sword. Any errors in the present article are, of course, my own. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV ISBN 978-90-04-23503-8 422 barry ager Bibliography Alexander, J.J.G., 1978. Insular Manuscripts 6th to the 9th Century (A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, vol. 1), London. Andrew, W.J. & Smith, R.A., 1931. The Winchester Anglo-Saxon bowl, Antiquaries Journal 11, 1–13. Arrhenius, B., 1982. Technische Analysen der Schwerter von Elvran und Gravråk, Norwegen, Studien zur Sachsenforschung 3, 155–167. Backhouse, J., 1981. The Lindisfarne Gospels, London. Behmer, E., 1939. 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