Bifrons Anglo-Saxon Cemetery - Grave 29
To
Bifrons Cemetery Introduction
GRAVE 29 - Grave of a woman, 9 feet in length,
including a space of 1 foot above the head, in which was dark soil as
of a body, not improbably that of a baby.
Finds At the left side a Roman
bronze coin, much worn.
Near the waist two hammer-shaped brooches, with
rounded lower ends, each throwing out five radiating points, and very
strongly resembling those of Grave 21, but without the settings of red
glass.
two hammer-shaped brooches
Rather higher lay a group of iron objects, consisting of three
keys (one broken to pieces), a knife, two iron rings, and lying flat
against the larger of the two a small diamond-shaped plate of iron,
perforated in the centre.
Under the waist a bronze buckle of
rectangular shape, with fragments of leather close by.
bronze buckle of
rectangular shape
On the right
arm a thin armlet of bronze.
At the neck a cluster of beads, nearly
all of amber, and, possibly strung in the same necklace,
four circular
pendants, of pure gold beaten into a thin
plate, and with golden loops for suspension. Of these the two smallest
are exactly alike, and apparently hammered from the same mould; and
these and the largest bear that broken type of ornamentation which
writers have compared to fragmentary snakes, but which comparison of
many specimens shews pretty conclusively to be merely blundered
imitation of figures from classical coins, not improbably Greek, rude
copy being taken from rude copy, till all trace of the original design
was lost. The fourth is a very remark able instance, and has already
been engraved in our Eighth Volume,* in illustration of Mr. Haigh's
paper
* Arch. Cant.,'
vol. viii,, p. 196
four circular
pendants