ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS 



incomplete or altogether wanting, some have a special interest apart from 

 their connection with burials of one kind or another. The foremost 

 place must be given to a massive finger-ring (fig. 5) ' of pure gold found 

 in the river Nene near Peterborough, in spearing for eels, immediately 

 under the Great Northern Railway viaduct, about 300 yards above the 

 site of the ancient bridge. This remarkable relic has a cylindrical hoop, 

 on which are two opposite bezels, with sets of three large pellets on both 

 sides of them. On one of these circular plates is engraved a geometrical 

 rosette with a cross in the centre (fig. 5a) ; and on the other, three tri- 

 angles interlaced (fig. 5b), while the edges are ornamented with zigzags, 

 and the loop with two open knots. All the designs are filled with niello, 

 but their signification is uncertain. The triangular device which occurs 

 on a piece of elk-horn from an island in the Lake of Malar, Sweden,^ 

 and seems connected with the worship of Frey, has also been considered 

 an emblem of the Trinity, and has certainly survived to the present day 

 as a Masonic symbol. The prominent pellets at once present an analogy 

 to a type of Merovingian rings found in considerable numbers on the 

 continent ; ' but the bezel generally bears a monogram or a bust with 

 inscription. On the other hand, though niello is often found on Roman 

 jewellery, the knotwork certainly points to a later date, and perhaps the 

 safest course is to assign this Peterborough ring to the early Carlovingian 

 period, about the year 800, by which time the interlacing riband 

 patterns, which are to be seen at their best in the early Irish manu- 

 scripts dating from the eighth century, were spreading over the north- 

 west of Europe, and the arts of Rome were reviving under the patronage 

 of Charlemagne. 



Next in importance comes the richly ornamented jewel* (fig. i) 

 found in a cemetery at Hardingstone in the year i860, and now in the 

 museum formed by the late General Pitt-Rivers at Rushmore.^ It was 

 described in the sale catalogue of the Bateman collection as an Anglo- 

 Saxon brooch (which it is not) in circular form, of bronze wdth a gold 

 front, decorated with a centre setting and a cross band formed of four 

 fishes extending to the border. In each angle is a wedge-shaped orna- 

 ment set with a garnet on a diapered gold ground, and having at each 

 extremity a circular setting originally filled with a garnet. The remaining 

 portion of gold-work is chased with a delicate interlacing pattern, which 

 is made up of animals with riband bodies, the convolutions of which can 

 be traced throughout, though the legs are detached in the more usual 

 manner of the time in this country. At the back are five projections, 

 four of which are pierced evidently for fixing the ornament to leather- 

 straps, the marks of which at right angles to one another may be seen on 

 the back of a set of very similar ornaments from Faversham, Kent, in the 

 Gibbs collection at the British Museum. Comparison with these further 



1 Figured in Journal of Archteolopcal Institute, vol. xiii. p. 87 and vol. xix. p. 336. 



8 Mr. Romilly Allen refers to Compte rendu of Prehistoric Congress at Stockholm, 1874, p. 634. 



s Deloche, Anneaux Sigi/laires. 



* Figured in the IlluitrateJ Archaohpst, vol. i. p. 128. 



5 The present drawing has been made by kind permission of Mr. A. Pitt-Rivers. 



253 



