EARLY MEDIEVAL KNIFE

1000

Copper-alloy mount, probably from the handle of a knife or sword. It is flat-ended and cylindrical, with four deep cut-outs with intervening points at the other end. Two points are distorted (bent out of shape). The sides, but not the unperforated flat end, are decorated with engraved lines forming rather crude arches which do not quite mirror the arched cut-outs. A transverse hole is filled with the remains of an iron pin; this cannot be seen on the photograph, but is just visible on the drawing, on the second view from the left. It passes through the object at the level of the top of the arched cut-outs and appears to respect the engraved decoration. Length 25.5mm. External diameter 15mm. Internal diameter 10.5mm. Perhaps 11th or 12th century.Compare four other examples on the PAS database: LEIC-F826C5, NARC-6D8F97, NMS-819015 (from Great Dunham, Norfolk) and HESH-4B4686. There is also a pair of more distant parallels on a sword from Lough Derg, Co. Tipperary, now in the National Museum of Ireland (acc. no. 1988:226; Ó Floinn in Roesdahl and Wilson 1992, 340-1, cat. no. 431; Peirce 2002, 140-1). Here the sword grip is reinforced at both ends by deeply scalloped grip-sleeves which, although decorated with silver and niello interlace in late 11th-century Irish style, are very close in shape to these English mounts. The closed end on the Great Dunham example suggests that it may have come from a knife (with no pommel) rather than a sword; alternatively, it might be a ferrule or staff terminal.Jason Gibbons, the illustrator of NMS-6B81F1, comments that there is a published example from Huntingdon, identified as a chess piece; Proc Cambs Antiq Soc vol 89 (2000), 95.