Lyminge Anglo-Saxon Cemetery - Grave 17
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Lyminge Cemetery Introduction
GRAVE 17. Probably a woman; 5 ft. 4
in.; 40-45 years of age; supine, full length, arms straight, left leg
crossed over the right at the ankle; 84 deg., 2ft. 6 in. deep.
Finds. A bronze-gilt buckle and
kidney-shaped attachment-plate (Pl. X, No. 2) at the right
waist, tongue pointing right. The leather belt was joined to the
buckle (Fig. 9, No. 2) by being clamped between the ends of a bronze
plate which passed around the stem of the buckle.
The two fastening rivets show a clearance of 1/16 in. to
accommodate the single thickness of leather. The attachment-plate,
which in this case merely covered up the junction of the belt and
buckle, consists of a bronze casing, 1/5 in. deep, with a thin bronze
back-plate. Three rivets travel from the surface of the plate to 1/16
in. beyond the back-plate to fasten the attachment-plate to the belt.
The attachment-plate is divided into cells which are set with thin
slices of coloured glass, Six of these inlays are missing. The four
remaining keystone-shaped ones are of red glass and the
elliptical-shaped inlays are of green glass. The glass slices are
chipped to shape on their curved edges and cut on their straight
edges. They are underlain by a layer of gold foil bearing a decoration
of ring and dot within squares of chequer pattern. The
attachment-plate was in poor condition when found and to facilitate
cleaning, the cells were stripped down and the inlays re-set.