MEDIEVAL BROOCH

1427

DescriptionThe reported object is the body of a silver annular brooch; the pin is missing. The brooch has been created by filing down the rim of, and removing the centre from, a silver coin of King Henry VI of England (1422-61); this has created a flat annular brooch with inner diameter of approximately 9mm, outer diameter approximately 22mm, with a thickness of the order of 0.6mm and weight of 2.27g. The brooch survives in two pieces, having at some stage been bent and broken; it has not been cleaned.The 'host' coin is a groat (4d) of Henry VI, struck at the mint of Calais between 1427 and 1434, belonging to either the 'Rosette-Mascle' (1427-30) or 'Pinecone-Mascle' (1430-4) coinages. (Removal of the outer legends in making the brooch precludes a definitive identification.) On the obverse, the King's portrait has been removed, leaving traces of his crown and a border of nine curved arches with fleurs where they meet; on the reverse, there are parts of the arms of a long cross and the inner legend [VIL - ◊ LA - CALI - SIE]. The obverse, and outer reverse, legends have all but been removed in making the brooch. The coin shows a certain amount of wear, but whether this results from circulation or from use as a brooch is not clear.Metal ContentEnglish medieval silver coins were struck to a standard around 11oz 2dwt, or sterling silver (92.5% fine). The brooch is most probably silver of around this standard, certainly well in excess of ten per cent precious metal by weight.DiscussionMedieval brooches with flat annular frames of silver or copper alloy, bearing inscriptions of religious or talismanic significance, are well known from Britain. The majority of such inscriptions are engraved, but raised lettering is also known. The use of a coin for this purpose is unusual. During the late 11th - early 12th centuries, there was in England a fashion for mounting coins as brooches, with pins and catches soldered to the obverse of the coin so that the cross that formed the reverse design was visible as that of the brooch (e.g., TAR 2003, 78); this continued spasmodically, e.g. TAR 2003, 161, a coin of Henri VII of Luxembourg (1288-1309). The use of coins to create annular brooches can, however, be paralleled by two converted coins of the Teutonic Order from the later 14th - early 15th centuries, which were found in a hoard from Ducker, in Bunge parish (Gotland), deposited in the early sixteenth century (GW/LW/JFD 1997, 370). The most recent of these brooches (post 1414-22) confirms a continuing fashion for annular brooches in the Baltic. That this style of brooch also remained in vogue at this time in south Wales is confirmed by a 15th-century silver brooch from Llandough near Cowbridge, with a raised talismanic formula in black lettering on a frame of similar form (Redknap 1994, fig. 13). Similar fourteenth/fifteenth-century brooches are also known from Ireland (e.g. Co. Meath: Deevy 1998, 109 no. RB 80).The Penllyn brooch, therefore, had all the impact of an inscribed brooch, though the surviving legend had no more significance for the wearer than the garbled versions of religious or talismanic texts sometimes found on medieval jewellery. The main departure of the Penllyn frame from other converted coin brooches, is that no perforation or restriction has been made to fasten the pin. While this feature is not essential, its absence raises the possibility that the conversion was never completed.Another British find of an annular coin-brooch has recently been reported, created from a 'Short Cross' penny of around 1205-9; this lacks its pin, but has been pierced to accommodate one (seen at the British Museum by E.M.B., 10 October 2007).