FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON
CEMETERY AT MILTON REGIS
By SONIA CHADWICK HAWKES and L. R. A. GROVE
INTRODUCTION
By L. R. A. GROVE
IN 1921 Sir Hercules Read presented to the Department of British and
Medieval Antiquities of the British Museum a seventh century Anglo-
Saxon gold pendant from Milton Regis, next Sittingbourne, Kent.
The register entry1 records that it had been found in 1916 by Mr. R.
Mills, a gravel digger, in a field about a quarter of a mile from the old
parish church at Milton. A few years later the Museum purchased
from Mr. E. Ealden several more objects from the same site. These,
six Anglo-Saxon silver sceattas and two more gold pendants,2 had
apparently been found at the same time as the earlier acquisition.
They were pubhshed together in a note by Reginald Smith,3 and were
assumed by him to have come from a single grave. But apparently
no further inquiries were set on foot and the exact find-place was not
ascertained. As a result, our information about this very important
Anglo-Saxon find was to remain tantalizingly vague and incomplete
until, in 1958, some more of the material came to light and made
further researches possible.
In November of that year Mr. D. M. Waters of Sittingbourne brought
to Maidstone Museum a box containing fourteen silver sceattas which
he had received from his great-aunt after the death of her husband.
The great-uncle who had found them some forty years ago turned out
to be the same Mr. R. Mills from whom Sir Hercules Read had obtained
the pendant. The coins were purchased for Maidstone Museum
in 1959,4 with the help of a Ministry of Education grant-in-aid through
the Victoria and Albert Museum. This grant was acquired mainly
through the good offices of Mr. R. H. M. Dolley, of the Department of
Coins and Medals, British Museum, to whom the sceattas were sub-
1 1921,10-20,1.
2 1926,4-10,1-2 (pendants) and 3-8 (sceattas).
3 Antiq. Journ., VI (1926), 446-7 and figs. See also J. D. A. Thompson,
Inventory of British Coin Hoards (1956), 103, no. 269, sub Milton Regis.
4 Accession no. 26,1959. Arch. Cant., LXXIII (1959), 230.
22
PLATE I
A. Pendants in the British Museum. Scale 5/6.
(Photo by courtesy of the Britixli Museum.)
B. Pendants in Maidstone Museum. Scale 1/1.
ANGLO-SAXON GOLD JEWELLERY FROM MILTON REGIS
[face p. 22
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
mitted for expert opinion. Mr. Dolley at once saw the correspondence
between these sceattas and the six from Milton already in his department's
possession, and was able to deduce that the twenty coins had
originally formed a small hoard. They have now been published as
such by Mr. S. E. Rigold.5 But this was not all. In 1962 Mr. Waters
again visited Maidstone Museum, this time with the last remaining
items from his great-uncle's collection : a pot and the jewellery which
prompted this paper. They were purchased in October 1962 with
money bequeathed to the Kent Archaeological Society by the late
Miss D. E. Johnston, formerly of Hallhouse Farm, Appledore.
Meanwhile it had been found that Mr. Mills had worked in 1916
for the firm of Messrs. Wills and Packham, Builders' Merchants and
Brick Manufacturers, of Sittingbourne. The Managing Director. John
E. Wills, kindly traced the finder's cousin Mr. G. Mills and another
workmate, Mr. J. Bunting, who well remembered the occasion when
the discovery was made. The find-spot, according to them and to the
firm's records, was just to the north of Cook's Lane, Milton Regis,
where the first new houses of Sittingbourne Urban District Council's
present housing scheme have now been built.6
THE FINDS
By SONIA HAWKES
NEW MATERIAL IN MAIDSTONE MUSEUM
1. Miniature pottery jar (Fig. 1, 1), 4-6 cm., rim diam. 6-6 cm.
Body squat with roughly flattened base and well-made horizontally
out-bent rim. Hand-made in brown paste with shell and
flint grits ; exterior smoothed and probably once burnished ;
burnt red and black in patches.
In its paste and finish this is a typical Anglo-Saxon pot, but the
size and form are more unusual. Miniature pots do sometimes occur
in Anglo-Saxon graves—I know one of comparable size from the late
seventh-century cemetery at Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire7—but
they are not very common. The Milton pot could have originated as
a copy of a seventh-century Kentish glass form, the squat jar,8 which
is also small and has a similarly shaped body. If so, there has been
an alteration to the rim before firing. I can imagine this abnormal
0 S. E. Rigold, ' The Two Primary Series of Sceattas ', Brit. Numismatic
Journ., XXX (1960), 46-7.
0 National Grid Reference TQ 90496477 approx.
7 Shortly to be published by Mrs. Miranda Hyslop.
8 D. B. Harden, ' Glass vessels in Britain and Ireland, A.D. 400-1000 ', Dark
Age Britain (ed. Harden, 1956), 132-167 ; Class VIII.
23
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
horizontally everted rim being produced by some mischance or experiment
in which it was pressed against a flat surface such as a floor or
table-top. However, this flattened form is not entirely without
parallels,9 and it may have had more significant history than appears
at present.
2. Bronze buckle and plate (Fig. 1, 2), length 6 cm., but lower part
of plate missing. The loop is oval with a straight bar to which
the shield-shaped back of the tongue is attached by a bronze
CD
\
^.\
\
i
FIG. 1.
So. 1, I; 2, £.
hook. The thin sheet-metal plate, originally triangular in
shape, was secured to the belt by three rivets (one now missing)
whose large domed heads were the chief ornamental feature.
Subsidiary ornament, in the form of a lightly scratched herringbone
pattern, can be seen around the surviving studs.
0 Dr. J. N. L. Myres tells me there is a pot with such a rim from the Howletts
cemetery in East Kent, British Museum 1936,10-13,1.
24
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
This type of buckle, with its characteristically triangular plate and
three domed studs, is very frequently found in seventh-century contexts
on the Continent, in Kent and occasionally elsewhere in England. It
is best known in its more ornamental versions, in precious metal
enriched with cloisonne work and Style II animal interlace, but
the cheaper and plainer bronze examples are also fairly numerous.
Parallels for our piece can be found amongst the grave-goods from the
Kentish barrow cemeteries,10 and, nearer at hand, from a cemetery
destroyed by brick-earth digging north-west of Sittingbourne parish
church.11 This class of buckle has been found almost exclusively in
male graves ; consequently the cheaper versions, if associated at all,
have been accompanied only by weapons, and are thus undateable
except within broad limits. Nevertheless, they seem to be contemporary
with their more ornate brethren, and these occur in richer and
more closely dateable grave groups. The best of them are the early
seventh-century groups from Taplow, Bucldnghamshire,12 and Wickhambreux13
and Breach Down14 in East Kent. On the continent,
according to the latest chronological schemes,15 versions of the same
general type came into use already before the end of the sixth century
and continued throughout the seventh. The typological and chronological
position of the Kentish series has yet to be worked out in detail,
but there is little evidence at present to show it had so long a life.
Although developed versions of the form appear in the Sutton Hoo
ship burial in Suffolk,16 conventionally dated middle seventh century,
and although the latest-looking of the Kentish group, the great silver
" fish " buckle from Crundale Down,17 may be as late as the third
quarter of the seventh century, these are exceptional pieces. The
majority seem to fall within the first half of the century, and most of
them early within that period. A study of the find-sequences from
the Kingston Down cemetery, which was in use from the beginning of
10 B. Faussett, Inventorium Sepulchrale (1856), pi. viii, 9 and ix, 1-2, and text
figs.: Kingston Down, graves 127, 134 and 163 ; Sibertswold graves 35 and 142 ;
Barfreston, grave 46.
11 C. Roach Smith, Collectanea Antiqua, I (1848), pi. xxxvi, 1.
12 Reginald A. Smith, Guide to Anglo-Saxon Antiquities (British Museum, 1923),
63-5, pi. v, figs. 71-2 ; N. Aberg, The Anglo-Saxons inEngland (1936), figs. 1 and 220 ;
R. F. Jessup, Anglo-Saxon Jewellery (1950, pi. xxxviii, 1 ; T. D. Kendrick, ' Polychrome
Jewellery in Kent', Antiquity, VII (1933), pi. iii, 5.
13 Arch. Cant., XVII (1887), 6-9 ; Aberg, op. cit., figs. 221 and 270; Kendrick,
op. cit., pi. iii, 2.
14 Archaeologia, XXX (1844), 52, pi. i, 20-21.
10 K. Bohner, Die Frdnkischen Alterthwmer des Trierer Landes (Germanische
Denkmaler der Volkerwanderungszeit, ser. B, I, 1958), vol. 1, chart fig. lb ;
Schmidt, DieSpate Volkerwanderungszeit in Mitteldeutschland (1961), chartfig. 49.
18 R. L. S. Bruce-Mitford, The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial (British Museum, 1947)
plates 1 and 19, b ; Jessup, op. cit., pi. xl.
17 Aberg, op. cit., fig. 222.
25
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
the seventh into the eighth century,18 suggests that, there, the large
buckles of our type were superseded towards the middle of that period
by small buckles with simple rectangular and openwork plates, the
latter at least being still in vogue around 700.19 All things considered,
then, we shall be quite safe in dating the Milton buckle to the first half
of the seventh century.
3. Oval gold cloisonne" pendant (Plate 1, 5 ; fig. 2, 1), length with
loop 4 cm. It consists of a fine cabochon garnet, 2-7 X 1-9
cm., enclosed in a gold collar, and a cloisonne frame 3-4 mm. in
width. The frame is divided into four main sections by
rectangular cells, at top, bottom, and sides, two of which still
contain insets of millefiori glass, blue in one and olive brown
in the other. The intervening panels in the lower half of the
frame contain cell-work of honeycomb pattern, set with flat-cut
garnets ; in the upper half, the pattern consists of tiny round cells
joined together and to the edges of the frame by straight cloisons ;
the roundels contain minute discs of lapis lazuli, the flanking
cells flat-cut garnets. All the garnets in the frame have been
mounted on paste and backed with chequered gold foil, a device
used to lend brilliance to the stones and bring up their colour.
The large central stone, on the other hand, has been set directly
on to the gold backplate, and, being thick, appears dark by
contrast. The suspension loop has beaded edges and mid-rib,
and between them have been soldered twisted wires (four on
one side, three on the other) that make a pseudo-plait pattern.
The base of the loop at the back has been neatly finished off by
an arc of beaded wire. No rivet is visible, and the loop has
evidently been soldered on. Although very effective and showy,
this pendant shows signs of clumsy craftsmanship : the width
of the frame is variable, and the cloisons are irregularly arranged.
I t is also somewhat damaged : two mosaic glass, and several
garnet and lapis lazuli settings are missing, and the suspension
loop is almost cut through at the top, presumably through long
friction against the thread of the necklace. Some of this damage
may be the result of modern use of the pendant since 1916.
Pendants consisting of cabochon garnets in simple gold or silver
settings are not uncommon in the richer seventh-century English
women's graves, but their stones are rarely so large and they do not
18 One of the graves contained a Frisian runic sceatta dateable to the early
eighth century : S. E. Rigold, op. cit., 18 and 62. 19 An openwork bronze buckle like those from Kingston was found with a
hoard of primary sceattas, dateable to c. 700, in a grave at Broadstairs. Rigold,
op. cit., 46.
26
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
normally have cloisonne frames. And when frames do occur, as on the
latticed glass pendant from Riseley, Horton Kirby,20 or the millefiori
pendant from Sibertswold (see below), they are simpler than this one.
The use of two different cell-patterns in this fashion is most unusual.
I can find no exact parallel for that on the upper part of the frame, but
the honeycomb cell-work in the lower part is at once recognizable. It
is one of the chief characteristics of a small group of large composite
brooches, from Faversham, Kent, and Milton-by-Abingdon, in Berkshire.
21 These brooches are probably the latest of the series, and are
generally dated to the middle years of the seventh century. The use
of millefiori, learnt apparently from the makers of the enamelled Celtic
Hanging Bowls, is extremely rare on Anglo-Saxon jewellery. Though
an attempt to simulate it can be inferred from the treatment of three
of the garnets on the Kingston brooch,22 it is not a feature of any of the
early seventh-century Kentish jewellery. The Sutton Hoo jeweller
may well have been the first English craftsman to employ it, and he
was certainly the only one to do so with artistic success.23 The attempt
on the Milton pendant is crude by comparison ; nevertheless, it is
important since it seems to be the only other piece of Anglo-Saxon
jewellery where millefiori is used in cloisonne work. Otherwise it is
found only on beads, and on two Kentish pendants, where it is used
mosaic-wise to cover the entire surface of a flat disc. These pendants
are of chronological importance because they belong to two of the all
too rare coin-associated grave groups. One is from the Sarre 1860
grave,24 together with the famous composite brooch, amethyst beads, a
Coptic bowl, and looped gold solidi of the emperors Maurice Tiberius
(582-602), Heraclius (610-641) and the Frankish king Clotair I I (613-628).
The other very similar example, mentioned above, is from Sibertswold
grave 172, and was part of a necklace consisting of cabochon garnet,
amethyst and latticed glass pendants, a gold pendant, and two looped
Merovingian tremisses from the mints of Marsal and Verdun.25 It has
recently been suggested that the Sarre coins, three minted at Marseilles
and the other at Aries, were brought to England from the south of
France, as an already constituted group, in about 620 A.D.26 Since we
cannot be sure when the latest of these coins was struck, whether in
20 Brit. Mus. Quarterly, XII (1938), pi. xxiii, 5 ; Arch. Cant., LIU (1940), plate I.
21 E. T. Leeds, Early Anglo-Saxon Art and Archaeology (1936), 120 f.; Kendrick,
op. cit., pi. iv, 2-3 ; Aberg, op. cit., figs. 204-5 ; Jessup, op. cit., pi. xxv.
22 This detail shows on none of the published photographs except faintly in
Jessup, op. cit., pi. xxvii.
23 Bruce-Mitford, op. cit., plates 18 and 23.
24 Arch. Cant., I l l (1860), pis. II-IV; Reginald Smith, op. cit., fig.80; Jessup,
op. cit., pi. xxvii.
20 Faussett, op. cit., pis. iv, 1-2, 7-9,13, xi, 1 and 3.
20 J. Lafaurie, ' Le Tresor d'Escharen', Revue Numismatique, 6e. se>., II
(1960), 177.
27
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
613 or some years later, I feel this date may be too early. However,
it is the date of burial which concerns us here, and this, to judge from
the amount of wear on the coins and their loops, must have been
somewhat later, possibly nearer 650 than 620. The coins on the
Sibertswold necklace are even more difficult to date, since they are
examples of a non-regal Merovingian coinage whose chronology is still
disputed.27 For our present purpose it must suffice to say that the
majority opinion is that the Sibertswold coins must have been buried
after 650. Millefiori may therefore have made its appearance in Kent
towards the middle of the seventh century, and its presence on the
Milton pendant, in combination with the similarly dated honeycomb
cell-work, suggests that this too is a work of the mid seventh century
at earhest.
4. Circular pale gold pendant (Plate I, 6 ; fig. 2,2), length with loop
3 • 1 cm. This is basically a sheet metal disc, with beaded wire
around the rim and around the hollow metal boss in the centre,
from which radiate four groups of four twisted filigree wires in
pseudo-plait pattern, making the arms of a cross. The loop,
made from a corrugated piece of sheet metal, is rolled under
the rim at the front, and allowed to continue vertically down
the back. It and the ornamental additions are soldered on.
The Sibertswold grave-group mentioned above, and datable to the
period after 650, includes an extremely fine gold pendant decorated
with a cross in pseudo-plait filigree work.28 Although, with its garnet
star and bosses, it is more expensive and elaborate, in its style and in
the crispness of its execution it can be compared with our Milton piece.
Pendants of the same general type, with some version of the cross
pattern, are one of the features of these later seventh-century Kentish
women's graves and were evidently worn as Christian symbols. The
Riseley grave-group contains one ornamented with a double cross,
concentric filigree rings, and httle gold bosses.29 Another from Wye
Down30 is decorated with a simple cross and an inner ring around a boss.
Yet another, in Dover Museum,31 has a cross and central garnet. One
could list many other such pendants with variants of the cross motif,
some, like the three others from Milton (see below), very elaborate :
this one is a simple example of the type. The fact that it is made of
pale gold, or artificial electrum, is interesting and may be of chronological
significance. During the second half of the seventh century,
27 See postscript.
28 Faussett, op. cit., pi. iv, 13.
20 Brit. Museum Quarterly, XII (1938), pi. xxiii, 4 ; Arch. Cant., LIII (1940), pi. I.
30 British Museum, reg. no. 1893, 6-1,187.
31 From a grave disturbed in 1956 by the Charlton railway tunnel, near Guston.
28
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
the English gold coinage, like that of the western continent, became
debased—a process well illustrated by the decline through electrum to
silver of the ' Two Emperors ' and the Kentish ' Pada ' thrymsas.32
The electrum phase seems to have lasted through the 70s and may
possibly have begun as early as the 60s. Since the making of coins
and jewellery were allied arts, sometimes practised by the same man,33
it is very possible that the change from gold to electrum, whether due
to a general shortage of gold or to other more complex circumstances,
affected the jewellery at the same time as the coins. The Milton
pendant is not the only pale gold piece among the Kentish pendants,
and it could be that a programme of analyses would throw new hght
on the chronological problem. For the moment all that can
profitably be said is that this Milton pendant may have been made
during the ' debasement' period in the third quarter of the seventh
century.
5. Gold pectoral cross (Plate 1,4 ; fig. 2, 3), length with loop 3 • 1 cm.
I t has hollow semi-circular-sectioned arms, gently expanded
towards the ends and decorated with three groups of four
lightly incised transverse lines, and, at the intersection, a
circular cell set with a cabochon garnet. The method of
construction was, first, to solder the garnet in its cell to the
sheet metal cross that forms the backplate ; then to solder on
the arched tops of the cross-arms, concealing the joints around
the central setting by the addition of a beaded wire frame ;
and finally to solder the suspension loop of corrugated sheet
metal over the end of the upper, and longer, arm of the cross,
and to close the open ends of the remaining arms with flat
garnet' stoppers,' only one of which now survives.
Pendant crosses have been found in a number of Anglo-Saxon
graves, and the Milton cross makes an interesting new addition to the
known series : it is not the less interesting because it is unlike any of
the others. The most famous of the crosses34 was buried with the body
of St. Cuthbert, a bishop of the Northumberland Church, and may well
have been his episcopal cross. The others, however, seem to have
come from the graves of women, and to have been worn by them
primarily as jewels, either alone or a part of a necklace. Nevertheless,
the crosses are generally regarded as an explicitly Christian symbol
82 Rigold, op. cit. C. H. Sutherland, Anglo-Saxon gold coinage in the light of the
Crondall Hoard (1948). 43 ff.
33 As in the case of the famous seventh-century goldsmith, St. Eligius.
34 R. L. S. Bruce-Mitford, ' The Pectoral Cross ', The Relics of Saint Cuthbert,
Durham Cathedral (1956), 308-25, plates XV-XVI. This account of the cross
supersedes that by T. D. Kendrick in Ant. Journ., XVLT (1937), 283-93. See also
Aberg, op. cit., fig. 260 ; Jessup, op. cit., pi. xxx ; etc.
29
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
and we can assume that these ladies were converts to the new faith.
None of the crosses can be dated to the early years of the seventh
century, and this is not surprismg since in most of England Christianity
was not estabhshed before 630, and in some places not till after 650.
Even in Kent, nominally Christian by 600, the progress of the Conversion
suffered a set-back in 616 upon the death of Ethelberht and it was
not till 640 that the kingdom was finally committed to the new religion.
The fashion for pectoral crosses appears at present to have begun
towards the middle of the century, and to have coincided with the
consolidation of the Conversion in eastern England. Probably the
earhest of the crosses so far Icnown are the jewels from Wilton in Norfolk
and Stanton near Ixworth, in Suffolk.35 The Wilton cross is set with a
gold solidus of Heraclius and Constantine (c. 620)36, and its cloisonne
work suggests it was made by the Sutton Hoo goldsmith, presumably
some time during the second quarter of the seventh century. The
similar Ixworth cross may be more or less its contemporary, but it was
repaired in antiquity and subsequently buried, together with the
mutilated remains of a local copy of a Kentish composite disc brooch,37
probably after 650. St. Cuthbert's cross, another cloisonne piece, was
buried, after being twice broken and twice repaired, in 687. Stylistically
the Cuthbert cross is unique, and it is therefore very difficult to
estimate when it was made. The evidences of rough usage are not a
reliable guide in this matter. However, in a general way its cloisonne
style appears to be a northern version of the late style current in the
south, and the cross may thus belong to the period around 650. The
remaining crosses are less elaborate. The seventh-century Kentish
cemeteries have produced quite a series, mostly with very simple
decoration : from Sibertswold, a gold cross with filigree and garnet
ornament ;38 from Chartham grave 9, a silver cross with silver boss and
engraved interlace39 ; from Kingston Down grave 142, an ornamented
silver-gilt cross ;40 from Wye Down a silver cross with central garnet ;41
from Breach Down42 and Wingham43, small, almost plain crosses. These
35 Kendrick, op. cit., pi. lxxvii. This paper was written before the discovery
of the Sutton Hoo Ship Burial, and Kendrick's dating is now corrected in Bruce-
Mitford, op. cit., 317 ff., and in ' The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial', Proc. Suffolk Inst.
Arch., XXV (1949), 35 ff., pi. iii. Cf. also Aberg, op. cit., figs. 258-9 ; Jessup,
op. cit., pis. xxviiiand xxxi.
30 Information from Mr. Philip Grierson, following his article ' Solidi of Phocas
and Heraclius : the Chronological Framework ', Numis. Ohron. 6 ser. XIX (1959),
131 ff.
37 Aberg, op. cit., fig. 202 ; C. Roach Smith, Collectanea Antiqua, IV (1857), 163.
38 J. Douglas, Nenia Britannica (1793), p. 67, text fig., no. 1 ; J. Y. Akerman,
Archaeological Index (1847), pi. xvii, 19.
30 Faussett, op. cit., pi. xi, 17.
40 J6id.,pl.iv,21.
11 British Museum, reg. no. 1893. 6-1. 200.
42 British Museum, reg. no. 1879. 5-24. 62 and 64.
43 Reginald Smith, op. cit., fig. 64.
30
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
crosses occur in Kent in graves of the same period as the cross-decorated
pendants and the pendants of cabochon stones. Kingston Down grave
142 produced, in addition to the cross, 12 amethyst and 86 other beads,
silver rings, a silver-gilt pin, a toilet set, comb, box-fittings, a cowrie
shell, and two kite-shaped pendants, one gold with a cabochon garnet,
the other silver set with an amethyst.44 The Wye Down grave contained
amethyst beads, silver wire rings, an electrum pin, and a circular
gold pendant with a double cross in filigree work.45 The crosses in these
graves were therefore worn in association with pendants of the types
discussed above, and are thus to be dated to the second half of the
seventh century. A similar date can be accepted on historical grounds
for the crosses from Winster Moor, Derbyshire48 and Desborough,
Northamptonshire,47 since these are parts of England where Christianity
was not established till after 650. In the case of the Desborough
cross, moreover, we can be sure of this on archseological grounds also.
The cross is the centre-piece of a beautiful necklace composed of pendants
of cabochon garnets set in gold frames, plain, bossed, gold pendants,
and biconical gold wire beads. The garnet pendants are identical with
those from Kentish graves, and notably the Sibertswold grave which,
as we have already seen, is to be dated by its coins after 650. The
plain gold pendants are more uncommon, but cheaper versions of them
made from silver are found in Kent and elsewhere. The gold wire
beads feature on the very similar necklaces from Brassington Moor,
Derbyshire48 and Roundway Down, Wiltshire.49 Identical gold beads,
together with silver copies of the gold pendants, have recently been
found in a new coin-dated grave at Finglesham, Kent,50 where they
were associated with a looped gold solidus of the Merovingian king
Sigeberht III (634-56), and an early electrum example of the ' Pada '
coinage. The dating of this grave depends on that of the ' Pada ' coin,
which has recently been placed in the 670s.51 According to this interpretation,
of the coin evidence, the Finglesham burial cannot have taken
place until 675 at earhest, and it is likely to have been even later.
This suggests that the Desborough necklace and cross, and the similar
44 Faussett, op. cit., 66 ff., pis. iv, 6, xi, 19, xii, 3, xiii, 2, etc.
45 British Museum, reg. nos. 1893. 6-1. 196-9 and 201-2.
40 Aberg, op. cit., fig. 261 ; E. Howarth, Catalogue of the Bateman Collection
(Sheffield Museum, 1899), p. 222.
47 Reginald Smith, op. cit., pi. iv, 4 ; Jessup, op. cit., pi. xxviii.
48 Howarth, op. cit., 222. G. Baldwin Brown, The Arts in Early England, IV
(1915),pl.cii,2.
40 J. Y. Akerman, Remains of Pagan Saxondom (1855), pi. I ; M. E. Cunnington
and E. H. Goddard, Catalogue of Antiquities in the Museum at Devizes (1934),
pi. lxxxii.
00 Excavated by the author in 1959, on behalf of the Ministry of Public Building
and Works.
01 Rigold, op. cit. 25 and 51. The dating has been further discussed in
correspondence.
31
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
assemblages from Brassington and Roundway Down, may also have
been buried well on in the second half of the seventh century, and, by
analogy, the same may be true of the Sibertswold 172 group. This is
important in the present context, because it is the Desborough cross,
with its hoUow circular-sectioned arms stoppered with gold, and its
central cabochon garnet, which most closely resembles the Milton cross.
To conclude, then, we may safely say that the Milton cross belongs to
the third quarter of the seventh century.
6. Thirty-two glass beads (Fig. 2, 4). 2 rings, translucent blue ;
1 triple ring, transl. turquoise ; 1 ring, transl. pale olive ; 12
short barrels, opaque red ; 1 truncated bicone, opaque white ;
2 barrels, opaque orange ; 9 short barrels, opaque green ; 1 ring,
opaque blue ; 3 melon beads, blue faience.
Virtually no research has been done on the subject of Anglo-Saxon
beads, and it is therefore very difficult to comment on them in detail.52
In this group, the melon beads are probably survivals from the Roman
period, the translucent blue glass rings either Roman or early Saxon,
and the rest probably seventh century. The opaque red and green
beads are very common in seventh century graves, although they may
sometimes occur in later sixth century associations. The opaque
orange beads, so far as I know, are never found either in England or
on the Continent before the seventh century. The beads may therefore
be assumed to be contemporary with the pendants.
7. Fourteen silver sceattas.
MATERIAL EST THE BRITISH MUSEUM
8. Six silver sceattas.
These twenty coins have been pubhshed together as Hoard II of
Rigold's inventory of the primary sceattas.53 They include his Types
A2, A3 and Bl, which are dated by him most convincingly, on historical
and numismatic grounds, between c. 695 and 705, in the early part of
the reign of Wihtred. These coins were not mounted as ornaments
and were probably buried in a purse. They are to be regarded as a
sample of the coinage current at the time of burial and need not,
therefore, have been kept very long after they were struck. Even so,
they can scarcely have been buried before the early years of the eighth
century.
52 But see the very useful study of beads in Bohner, op. cit., 71-82, plates 8-9.
53 Rigold, op. cit. 46-7, eto.
32
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
Q
C
FIG. 2.
3
33
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
9. Circular gold pendant (Plate I, 1), length with loop 3-8 cm.
A sheet metal disc with beaded wire forming the rim, the
concentric inner ring, and the outline of the Greek cross. The
border is filled with a filigree pattern of Omega-shaped scrolls,
and the space between the cross arms with S-shaped scrolls and
pseudo-cloison motifs. In the centre is a cabochon garnet in
a plain collar encircled by finely beaded wire. The corrugated
loop is soldered on.
10. Circular gold pendant (Plate I, 2), length with loop 3-1 cm.
A sheet metal disc with beaded and plaited wire around rim and
central cell (now empty), and beaded wire outlining the arms of
a cross. These are decorated with paired bird-heads, executed
in filigree, and the spaces between them are filled with S- and
Omega-shaped filigree scrolls. The corrugated loop is soldered
on. The edge of the pendant has been torn and patched in
antiquity.
11. Circular gold pendant (Plate I, 3), length with loop 3-8 cm.
A sheet metal disc with beaded wire rim, inner ring, and edging
to central setting. The latter consists of a star-shaped cluster
of cloisonne cells, 3 of which still contain sliced garnets, around
a central circular cell (now empty). Groups of beaded wires
radiate from the star to form the arms of a cross. The entire
field is covered with S- and Omega shaped filigree scrolls. The
corrugated loop is soldered on.
These three pendants are elaborate versions of the common crossdecorated
type already discussed (under 4 above). Such dense filigree
scroll decoration occurs frequently on seventh-century Kentish jewellery
and appears outside Kent from the middle of the century on such pieces
as the Winster Moor cross or the pendant from Womersley, Yorks.54
The garnet settings are not unusual, and the star pattern on 11 is very
like that on the pendant from Sibertswold grave 172, mentioned above.
We shall not be far wrong if we date these three pieces to the third
quarter of the seventh century, with the rest of the Milton jewellery.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about them is that they are very
similar, both in their metal and their ornament, and it is possible that
all three were made in the same workshop.
General discussion of the finds
I t is most unfortunate that no reliable information has come down
to us about the discovery of these objects from Milton. There can,
04 Leeds, op. cit., pi. xxx, d.
34
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
however, be no doubt at all that they were grave-goods from seventhcentury
Anglo-Saxon burials destroyed by the gravel-digging. The
number of the graves cannot now be known, nor can we tell for certain
which objects came from the same grave group. It is because of this
that I have thought it necessary to discuss each object independently
and in detail, to ascertain as far as possible how nearly contemporary
they are. The results can now be summarized as follows : the buckle
probably came from a man's grave of the first half of the seventh
century ; the pendants are feminine jewellery of the period c. 650-75,
and, with the beads, must have come from one or more women's graves
of the second half of the seventh century ; the twenty sceattas formed
a small hoard buried, no doubt in a grave, around 700 at earliest ; the
small pot cannot be precisely dated, but is presumably seventh century
like the rest. From this it should be clear that the material came from
more than one grave. And this is perhaps as far as one can legitimately
go in the matter, since any further speculation must be regarded as
hypothetical. Nevertheless, a little more can perhaps be said. I have
suggested above that the three gold pendants in the British Museum
are very alike and may have been made in the same workshop. This
would further suggest that they had been acquired at the same time
and worn and buried on the same necklace, and are thus to be regarded
as a grave group. The fact that two of them were bought from Mr.
Ealden and the other from Mr. Mills need not affect the issue, since the
contents of a single grave can have been split up between the two
workmen who found it. The same thing happened with the sceatta
hoard, where six coins were taken by one man and fourteen by the other.
This interrelationship between the two collections makes it possible
that the other pendants owned by Mr. Mills, and now acquired by the
Kent Archasological Society, originally formed part of the same group
as those now in the British Museum. A necklace consisting of the
beads and the six gold pendants would be an unusually, but not impossibly,
rich assemblage, and would make a group perfectly acceptable
on chronological grounds. But of course there is no stylistic relationship
between the Maidstone three, nor between them and the British Museum
group, so any original connection cannot now be proven. Reginald
Smith's assumption, accepted by Rigold, that the British Museum
pendants were from the same grave as the sceatta hoard, is even more
problematical. There is nothing in the original record to justify so
definite a statement. It is just possible that the pendants were buried
as late as 700, but on the whole I think it unlikely. The more or less
contemporary sceatta hoards from Broadstairs55 and Breach Down56
50 H. Hurd, Some Notes on Recent Archaeological Discoveries at Broadstairs
(1913), 18-27, figs. 11,12 ; Rigold, op. cit., 46.
co C. Roach Smith, Collectanea Antiqua, I, 7, pi. v i ; Rigold, op. cit., 47.
35
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
came from graves which otherwise contained only a buckle and minor
articles perhaps connected with the purse. Nothing at all is recorded
as being found with the other related sceatta hoards, and some of these
also came from graves. In general, the practice of burying personal
possessions with the dead seems to have been abandoned by about 700,
probably through the influence of the Church, and Rigold has suggested
that the purses of coins which appear in graves about this time represent
' the purchase price paid by someone who had acquired arms or other
costly possessions of the deceased d'occasion and were buried so that
the ghost should not feel that he had been robbed '.57 This idea of coins
as substitutes for grave-goods is perfectly in accordance with the
evidence, and if we accept it there can be no further question of the
pendants having been buried with the sceattas. Even if one does not
accept this view, one must still resist the temptation to add the Milton
finds to the list of coin-dated grave groups. There simply is not enough
evidence to justify it. Yet despite the uncertainty about associations,
the Milton jewellery is very interesting, and it makes an important
new addition to the corpus of seventh-century Kentish metalwork.
THE SITE
Mr. Grove's good work in establishing the site of these new finds
has enabled us to add one more spot to the distribution-map of Anglo-
Saxon cemeteries in the Milton and Sittingbourne district (Fig. 3).
This one (no. 1) is situated on rising ground above the 25 ft. contour,
a quarter of a mile north of the end of Milton Creek, and just east of
the Old Court House at Milton. A sixth century cemetery (no. 2)58
was found, towards the end of the nineteenth century, less than half a
mile to the north-east, and material from fifth century graves, now in
Maidstone Museum, may come from this site or from another at the
east end of Kemsley Downs. Other seventh-century cemeteries,
containing some rich graves, have in the past been found north-west of
Sittingbourne parish church (no. 3),59 at the west end of Sittingbourne
(no. 4),60 and at Chalkwell (no. 5).61 A single burial was found at Murston
(no. 6),62 and possible Anglo-Saxon chance-finds have been recorded
from Grovehurst (no. 7) and Fulstone Manor (no. 8).63 Finally, the
07 Rigold, op. cit., 8.
08 George Payne, Collectanea Cantiana (1893), 118-21. Finds in the British
Museum.
00 Roach Smith, op. cit., 97-106, pis. xxxvi-xxxviii; Payne, op. cit., 103-8.
Finds in Dover Museum.
00 Proc. Soc. Antiq., 2 ser., VIII (1880), 275, 606-8 ; Payne, op. cit., 108-10.
Finds in the British Museum.
01 Proc. Soc. Antiq., 2 ser., IX (1892), 162 ; Payne, op. cit., I l l , pi. xxiii. Finds
in the British Museum.
02 Rochester Naturalist, no. 131, VI (1928), 106-7.
03 George Payne, Catalogue of the Museum of Local Antiquities, Sittingbourne
(1882), 33, nos. 394-5.
36
FINDS FROM A SEVENTH CENTURY ANGLO-SAXON CEMETERY
name of the nearby village of Bobbing64 is probably a survival from
an -ingas folk-name datable to the early years of the Anglo-Saxon
settlement, This cluster of sites, each representing an Anglo-Saxon
! Iwade
N
J .1
\ ; i (
/ / / i \ i
n V. / lJ).N
\ \ (?) s \.
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