Talk on the Staffs Hoard for Fitzwilliam Museum, 27th July 2011. 30 mins.

INTRODUCTION

SLIDE 1Hello, I’m going to talk about the Staffordshire Hoard, which is I think pretty much the most exciting archaeological find in my lifetime. The press found it exciting too [SLIDE 2] – here’s the Daily Mail on the day the news was released in September 2009. Shortly afterwards there were queues round the block to see the hoard [SLIDE 3] as an appeal was launched to save the hoard for the nation. I’ll explain why this appeal was needed later.

The hoard has changed academic and public views of the Anglo-Saxons, and in this it can be compared with the very famous finds at Sutton Hoo [SLIDE 4]. Before Sutton Hoo was found, the general view was that the Anglo-Saxons were illiterate farmers who did a bit of bloodthirsty warfare in their spare time. The finds at Sutton Hoo opened our eyes to their craftsmanship; their international contacts; and really just the sheer available wealth, and sophistication, of artefacts available at the top rank of society at the time.

The Staffordshire Hoard is very much the same date as Sutton Hoo. I’ll get on to a precise date later on when you’ve seen the kinds of objects it contained. For now, let’s call it seventh century AD.

[SLIDE 5] England in the 7th century AD; it was made up of a series of kingdoms, and this map represents our best guess as to where the people making up these kingdoms lived. It’s best not to draw precise boundaries, as the kingdoms weren’t territories, but people. Our source for this is Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, which he finished writing in 731 – this is by far the best source for our historical knowledge of the seventh century.

I’ve approximately marked the place where the Staffordshire Hoard was found. It looks to us as if it’s right in the centre of Mercia, and indeed it is, but in other ways it is on the edge of Anglo-Saxon England in the seventh century.

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The name ‘Mercians’ means people of the border. It’s the same Old English word as ‘march’, as in the Welsh Marches. And very few archaeological sites and finds of early Anglo-Saxon date come from this part of the country.

Here’s a map of early Anglo-Saxon burial sites [SLIDE 6 ] and as you can see, where the hoard was found is not outside where you would expect to find the early Anglo-Saxons, but it is right on the edge.

I’m using a map of burial sites because until now this has been where we find rich deposits of early Anglo-Saxon metalwork – we’ve never had a hoard like this before. We also don’t know much about this area of Mercia from historical sources either. Bede was a Christian monk from Northumbria and he really doesn’t seem to like the Mercians. [SLIDE 7] Their most remarkable seventh-century king was a famous pagan called Penda, who ruled from some time in the 620s or 630s until 655, and spent most of this time killing other kings – at least five of them. All but one of these were great heroes of Bede. So Bede doesn’t bother to tell us much about Penda, or his people, the Mercians.

So you could say that the Staffordshire Hoard fills a gap in our knowledge – but more accurately it turns all our hitherto accepted ideas on their heads. We weren’t expecting anything Anglo-Saxon here on the edge of England. And we most particularly were not expecting what we got, because this is the first hoard from early Anglo-Saxon England. It’s like nothing we’ve ever seen before.

WHAT’S IN THE HOARD

Now let’s see what it actually contained.

Gold

[SLIDE 8] The easiest way to sum up the materials involved is that there’s lots of gold. In terms of weight – I’m afraid still with lots of mud adhering, as you will see – it’s about three-quarters gold. Gold, of course, doesn’t decay or corrode in the ground and so it is all still in fantastic shiny condition.

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In terms of the kinds of objects, [SLIDE 9] we have a very restricted range. Most of it is military equipment, 60% as you can see here, but oddly we don’t have a full range. Military items

[SLIDE 10] Here are some seventh-century warriors in their kit and you can see the range of weapons that an Anglo-Saxon man might carry. In the Staffordshire Hoard, we only seem to have the gold and silver bits and the occasional piece of copper alloy, so we can only identify those items which had gold and silver parts. These seem to be parts of at least two helmets, possibly a shield mount or two, and masses and masses of swords and seaxes.

[SLIDE 11] This shows you the various parts of a sword, a complete one found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk (Sutton Hoo exploded diagram), and a seax will be the same, except that the blade has only one cutting edge.

[SLIDE 12] Here are the numbers of the different sword fittings within the Staffordshire Hoard. There are c. 90 pommels, 4 pommel rings, and somewhere over 350 hilt fittings. With these ones you can see that one is from a sword and one from a seax, but often you don’t know which you are dealing with.

Bear in mind that from the evidence of the Sutton Hoo sword there are usually at least 7 elements from a single hilt. But there is only one pommel per sword or seax, so that gives us a minimum number of 90 swords or seaxes in total.

[SLIDE 13] Scabbard fittings include at least 13 pyramids and 2 buttons – these are a bit mysterious, but probably used to tie the sword or seax into the scabbard. They generally have the most fabulous garnet work on them, amazing detail in a tiny space. [SLIDE 14 Sutton Hoo helmet] Helmets – early Anglo-Saxon helmets are incredibly rare. Apart from this fantastic example from Benty Grange in Derbyshire, there is also [SLIDE 15] the famous Sutton Hoo one and another from Wollaston in Northamptonshire. Note these hinged cheekpieces on these two. And now, in the Staffordshire Hoard, we have a fourth and a fifth early Anglo-Saxon helmet, at least, if not more! The

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most obvious of the helmet components is this cheekpiece [SLIDE 16] made from a gold and silver alloy – you can see here how the little hinges attaching it to the cap of the helmet have been torn away.

This is the only piece of a gold helmet in the hoard. What a ludicrous material to make it out of, although it should be remembered that the Benty Grange helmet was even more peculiar – it was made from horn panels within an iron frame. Of course we are obviously missing the other cheekpiece, but it might be assumed that the rest of the helmet would be made of the same material and in the same style.

The only other helmet element made from gold is this little object [SLIDE 17] which seems almost certainly to be part of the crest of a helmet, the reinforcing and deflecting bar which runs across the top of the head. You can see the curve.

Both the cheekpiece and the crest might be from one single helmet, but then there are a series of amazing stamped silver foils which should come from a different helmet. Again they can be paralleled on the Sutton Hoo helmet, [SLIDE 18] where they are made from tinned bronze which is imitating silver. [SLIDE 19] The ones from the Staffordshire hoard are rather superior, as they are actually made of real silver, but with the same amazing weird scenes which appear to show heroes and gods in action. (Guided tour to which ones you have).

There are a range of other bits and pieces from helmets which we might be able to combine with the foils to make up this second helmet [SLIDE 20]. So, the swords and seaxes and helmets are the major pieces of weaponry that have been identified so far.

Christian objects

Another category which is very prominent within the hoard, and one that might be thought of as battle equipment too, are the Christian crosses. There are several within the hoard. [SLIDE 21] Two small crosses that might have been fixed to something; a medium-sized cross which probably hung round someone’s neck; and a really huge one [SLIDE 22] that might have been fixed on a staff and used in processions, or been carried into battle like a kind of standard. It’s difficult to get an idea of what it looked

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like originally, as it’s been folded up, but here it is [SLIDE 23] reconstructed by an artist from Birmingham City Museum. These garnets have all come away – here’s [SLIDE 24] another go at a photo, with the detached settings, and a close-up of some of the big garnets. This one seems to have come from a gem-cutting workshop in Constantinople, now Istanbul, that’s where most of them have been found.

The final object that is probably part of a cross is this one [SLIDE 25] – this is definitely one of the most interesting items in the whole hoard. It is probably, by analogy with the big cross, one arm from another big cross, but of course the fascinating thing is the inscription.

It’s hard to read now from a screen because the object has been folded in half, but here are both sides [SLIDE 26] with some help in reading it. This is a copy of the inscription, then a transliteration of the Latin. A text very like this inscription, but not identical to it, occurs twice in the Bible. So at the bottom are the two sources translated.

I hope you will agree that it is one of the more warlike bits of the Bible that’s been chosen. And arguably all of these Christian objects are also objects of power – in the ancient world, decisions about which god to worship were taken at least partly on the basis of which god would help you to win in battle.

So that’s a brief canter round some of the objects. There are of course a great number of mystery objects [SLIDE 27], but to do these justice would take all afternoon!

So I’m going to go on now to have a look at the materials and craftsmanship in a bit more detail, and then think about the date and why the hoard might have been buried.

MATERIALS

Garnets and glass

All of these objects are inlaid with garnets. Most are set in this cell-work with flat tops; this is called cloisonné garnet work. Others have a domed surface, known as cabochon-cut. [SLIDE 28] Here’s some close-ups of the different types, the cabochon garnets are on a silver backplate here.

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Cloisonné is the main technique of garnet work in the seventh century AD and it’s very common in the hoard. The garnets were probably split along planes of natural fracture to make thin slivers, which were then cut to shape using an abrasive wheel. The shapes can be very complicated [SLIDE 29]. This little bird is 2½ cm long but look at the amazing work that has gone into it. Underneath each of the specially shaped stones you can see stamped gold foil – can you imagine how difficult it would have been to create the dies that were used to stamp this? The foil reflects the light through the garnet, and it is found beneath nearly every garnet in the hoard that’s been looked at so far.

Cloisonné garnets would usually have been ground flat after setting, to give a perfectly flat polished surface, but occasionally you can see more sophisticated ways of shaping them [SLIDE 30]. This slide shows a series of tiny garnets cut at an angle, above, and below are these ribbed garnets. This kind of relief cutting of garnets is a revived Late Roman technique and is extremely rare – I only know of two Anglo-Saxon parallels to these ribbed garnets, and those are the two sword buttons from Sutton Hoo.

Apart from garnets, there is also quite a bit of interesting glass work [SLIDE 31] – you can see blue glass insets here on the left, and what’s known as millefiori on the right. This is a series of glass rods fused together by heating and cut across into slices. This is a relatively crude example. Here’s another on a much finer scale [SLIDE 32] – those little crosses are truly amazing.

Filigree

The most common form of decoration in the hoard, though, is known as filigree. [SLIDE 33] Filigree is decoration made up of beaded or twisted wires and pellets. You can see from this slide [SLIDE 34] that about two-thirds of the pommels have filigree decoration, but no two designs are identical.

ARTThe decoration on almost all of the objects in the Hoard consists of animals. [SLIDE 35] Here on the cross the animals are in relief and are very clear, very easy to see; heads, legs, feet – or paws, I should say perhaps. [SLIDE 36] Here are similar animals, though not so interlaced, in

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the repoussé technique, where a thin foil is placed over a relief die and bashed hard; and also in cloisonné [SLIDE 37], animals and birds again.

On the helmet cheekpiece we have excellent easy-to-see animals [SLIDE 38], then on this, [SLIDE 39] which is still a mystery object – we don’t know what it is from – the animal body parts are much harder to see (feet here, and heads here). There is more concentration on the ribbon-like interlacing bodies.

[SLIDE 40] Then on the filigree pommels you can sometimes see the animal elements, but in other places they are disappearing, and eventually they are gone altogether and you have pure interlace patterns.

WHAT’S THE HOARD FOR?

Now the next thing to look at is what the hoard actually was for, and why it was buried where it was. There have been a number of suggestions [SLIDE 41] – I think it’s most likely to be a goldsmith’s hoard, but everyone has their own ideas.

Firstly, we don’t yet know – and we may never know now – whether it was buried for safekeeping, or lost accidentally, or deliberately abandoned as a kind of sacrifice. You may think it’s not possible for this kind of thing to be just lost, but most of the objects were small; larger items like the cross were folded up; and the whole thing would have fitted, it’s been estimated, into a large shoebox. It only takes someone to carefully hide it in a bramble bush while they had supper and a couple of drinks, then a couple more, then get into a fight, etc etc, for it to be lost for hundreds of years.

FINDSPOT

Now this leads me on briefly to why it was buried where it was. [SLIDE 42] You can see that the findspot was just north of Birmingham, just over the boundary into Staffordshire, and that it was just south of the Roman Watling Street. [SLIDE 43] Zooming in, here is Watling Street, running east-west. The site is very easy to see from Watling Street, especially as all the lorries thunder down from the west – you can’t see it from the east, and I wonder if that is significant.

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There’s been a huge lot of work on the landscape of the findspot already, and what this has come up with is that (as far back as we can go) it was always very marginal ground. The place-names suggest that it was wooded, and then later it was part of the royal forest of Cannock, then a common, with rabbit warrens. It’s always been a bit wild, apparently not often visited.

[SLIDE 44] The excavation that was carried out after the hoard had been discovered did not, unfortunately, reveal anything useful about the context. It seems that the hoard had never been deeply buried, because no pit or anything else was discovered. That is, if it had been buried at all, rather than left in a hollow tree or a tangle of scrub.

The geophysics was a bit more revealing [SLIDE 45]. You can see here a curvilinear feature, and although this turned out to be geological – it was a natural patch of clay –I think it is significant. It’s near the top of the hill (contours) and the clay would have held moisture well, better than the rest of the field, so the vegetation would have been different. It would have been a distinctive place, where you might reckon you could find something again if you buried it. Or it might have been a tangled mass of brambles into which you could shove a sack to hide it at short notice.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Lastly I’d like to think a bit about the historical context of the hoard. As to date, there’s nothing obviously later than seventh century in the hoard. How early in the century it could be depends on your view of the development of Christianity. There are a lot of similarities between the animal art and that found on very early Christian manuscripts such as the Book of Durrow, [SLIDE 46] but this unfortunately doesn’t have a precise date either. How early might the crosses be, and the inscribed strip with its Biblical inscription, bearing in mind that the first Christian king of Mercia began ruling in 658? There is still a lot to think about in terms of date.

The most tempting historical event to link the hoard with is in fact the fall of our famous pagan king Penda. Penda is incredibly successful in his battles right up to his death in 655, and could easily have amassed a great treasure of spare gold-hilted swords. These could have been taken apart for recycling; they could have been transported along Watling Street en route

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to a royal treasury, a gift-giving, or a craftsman; and they could have been stolen.

Or they may have been deliberately buried, and if we are looking for an emergency to prompt the burial of the hoard, Penda is killed at the battle of Winwaed in 655 and Mercia comes under Northumbrian rule for three years. This is the biggest ever national disaster for the Mercians.

If this hoard speaks of anything it must be wealth, and the political power that comes with wealth. It is remarkable that we have the spectacular rise and fall of Mercia in the seventh century, so perfectly symbolised by the objects in the hoard and their eventual fate.

[SLIDE 47] So that is the story so far of the Staffordshire Hoard. You can find out more by going to this website – it’s got articles on the fieldwork, the landscape and place-names, the inscription, all sorts of articles on the finds, and some on what it may all mean.

I’ve also got some leaflets here which explain the system by which finds such as this can be claimed by museums. Certain archaeological finds – mainly gold and silver objects and coin hoards, but also prehistoric hoards and some other categories – come under the legal provisions of the Treasure Act 1996, and can legally be claimed by museums. The museum then pays a reward to the finder and the landowner which is equal to the market value of the objects – and this value is set by an independent panel of experts.

The experts valued the Staffordshire Hoard at £3,285,000, so this figure had to be raised by Birmingham Museum through a public appeal. The Art Fund, the National Heritage Memorial Fund and the local councils also put substantial sums towards the acquisition, and now you can go and see it on display – parts of it anyway - while the rest is being cleaned and researched.

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