Spectacular hoard of Saxon gold discovered

The hoard contains in excess of 1500 objects made from various metals - 5kg of gold and 1.3kg of silver - by contrast the > Sutton Hoo > find contained 1.66kg of precious metals.

This hoard is perhaps the most important collection of Anglo-Saxon objects found in England. It compares and perhaps exceeds those objects found at Sutton Hoo. Originally discovered by metal detectorist Terry Herbert in July 2009 and subsequently excavated by Birmingham University Archaeology Unit and Staffordshire County Council. Leslie Webster, former Keeper of Prehistory and Europe at the British Museum describes this discovery as: “…this is going to alter our perceptions of Anglo-Saxon England in the seventh and early eighth century as radically, if not moreso, as the 1939 Sutton Hoo discoveries did; it will make historians and literary scholars review what their sources tell us, and archaeologists and art-historians rethink the chronology of metalwork and manuscripts; and it will make us all think again about rising (and failing) kingdoms and the expression of regional identities in this period, the complicated transition from paganism to Christianity, the conduct of battle and the nature of fine metalwork production - to name only a few of the many huge issues it raises. Absolutely the metalwork equivalent of finding a new Lindisfarne Gospels or Book of Kells.”

Beautiful pieces. I love the red stone inlay.
I’m pretty surprised they could work precious
stones that way. Delicate work.

Looks like the staffordshirehoard.co.uk site is
experiencing some high loads.

Must have contracted with some skilled Irish metal workers. Those Saxons, always working an Angle.

:laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

I think it’s cloisonee, which means it’s glass rather than stone. Similar pieces from the Sutton Hoo hoard were made that way. Gold (or whatever metal you’re using) wire is laid on the surface of the metal to define the edges of the shapes, and then a paste of ground glass is added to fill the spaces. After a firing, the glass fuses. The gold background reflects light through the glass, giving a very bright gemlike effect

On the middle piece, it looks like the jeweller textured the gold background before adding the enamel to increase the reflected light. It’s a nice effect.

Incredible break from the news cycle. Wow. Thanks for posting it.

Neat!

I was wondering about that.

Beautiful work!

Amazing that they survived in such good condition for so long.


–James

I wouldn’t be surprised if the “red glass” were actually garnets. I don’t think cloisonné had achieved that level of clarity at that time. If they are garnets that would be quite some skill for that period.

That’s the other possibility. With 12 pounds of gold artefacts, there’s likely to be some of each.

For comparison, here’s a piece from the Sutton Hoo ship-burial trove:

This piece is definitely cloisonné, but also appears to contain some actual garnets

The Sutton Hoo burial dates from within a few decades either side of the year 700, which means its likely no more than a generation or two younger than the new find, and might easily be exactly contemporary.

I hope The National Geographic Magazine does a feature on this.

a fantastic find indeed . i would love to make a find like that 1 day :open_mouth: .