332 (29)

305

Beads

The 217 beads and related items discussed below are madę from materials morę diverse than those for any other category of object in this volume. Semi-precious minerals - especially amber (which comprises morę than three ąuarters of the objects in this section) and also jet and rock ery stal are represented, but there are no prec-ious materials. Manufacturing waste and associ-ated finished beads (interpreted as accidental losses in the workshop) comprise amber, jet and red-coral items. Some of the evidence for amber-bead making from the BC72 site has already been published (Mead 1977, 211-14); it can now be dated morę closely, and is here presented in a different format, together with similar materiał found on other sites. Only two glass beads are included, and there are also only two of metal. No wooden bead or definite example of bonę from the sites included here comes from the period with which this present study is concemed (both of the latter materials are represented among beads of 16th-century datę from waterfront sites). Waste pieces of bonę from which beads were cut are included below, sińce they are elear evidence for the use of bonę beads which have not been recovered. Beads, including pearls, were used in large numbers as elaborate trimmings for dress in the late-medieval period (eg St John Hope 1907, 474 pis XLVIII & XLIX and D King in Alexander and Binski 1987, 471 no. 606 for seed pearls set in trails on a mitrę).

It is likely that many of the larger beads described below were for rosaries. Rosaries should properly consist of three chaplets, each of 15 dizaines of Ave Marias (each of 10 smaller beads) and 15 Patemosters (each being a single larger bead), but the number of beads varied in tne medieval period (Evans 1970, 50). The medieval patemosterers of London do not have a high profile in published records (Veale 1969, 141) though they had given their name to Pater-noster Row to the north of St. Pauls Cathedral by the early 14th century (Harben 1918, 459). A London jewelleris stock in 1381 included beads of wood, white and yellow amber, coral, jet and silver gilt, Ave beads of jet and blue glass, and cheaper sets of bonę for children (Riley 1868, 455). Most of these materials are represented below, apart from silver (instead there are cheaper tin versions) and wood, and the glass beads that have been recovered are green. The recent finds also include beads of crystal. The coral beads below are probably too smali to be from rosaries. The tiniest of them all (no. 1551) would have had to accompany a number of similar beads of the same materiał even to exploit its striking colour. Recovery of items as smali as beads is somewhat haphazard. Sieving is probably the ideał means of recovery, but it was not carried out on the sites represented below.

A relatively simple descriptive classification has been adopted for the shapes of the beads described below, in preference to very complex altematives used elsewhere, sińce the value of presenting this evidence at a greater level of detail is not elear (cf Guido 1978, 4 & 5).

AMBER

For a recent assessment of Baltic amber and its use (principally in a prehistorie context) see CW Beck in Todd 1985; for a wider summary of the materiał and its occurrence, see Webster (1975, 510-12). The large number of well preserved amber items recovered includes three groups of materiał representing bead-manufacturing waste: items from TL74 layers 2515, 2525, 2529 and 2532 - all from the same ceramic-phase 9 dump (late 13th/early 14th century), from BC72 context 250 of ceramic phase 10 (mid 14th-century, cf Mead 1977), and from TL74 context 306 of ceramic phase 11 (late 14th-century). The great majority of all these items are unfinished. Apparently finished beads are listed first; those from the same contexts as the manufacturing waste are marked *. See under Jet, Red Coral and Bonę below for further items from BC72 context 250.

A basie threefold colour division has been used below: orange, yellow and offwhite (translucent pale yellow) see colour pl 9C; the beads are complete and translucent unless stated.

Four pieces of amber from the following items, selected to cover the period and the different