357 (21)

330

Dress Accessońes

plain hoop, and set with a blue glass cabochon was excavated at Lyveden, Northamptonshire (Steane and Bryant 1975, 114, no. 51, fig 43). It has been dated stylistically to the 13th century. However, the datę of the finger ring from London, and three examples in silver from the Lark Hill hoard, Worcester, which was concealed c.1173-74 or a few years later (Akerman 1855, 201, pl XVII, nos. 1-3; Thompson 1956, 148 no. 381; Stratford 1984, 293 no. 320a-c) indicate that these finger rings were already common in Eng-land by the last ąuarter of the 12th century. Further dating evidence in respect of finger rings of this generał type comes from the tomb of Duke Albert de Cuyck, Prince-bishop of Liege (died 1200). He was buried with a silver finger ring, which has a cast hoop with moulded shoulders and an oval, rather than a rectangular, bezel (Musee Curtius, Liege).

A copper finger ring with a rectangular bezel which has lost its original setting, and is no w in a very delicate State of preservation (no. 1617, fig 216), may also belong to the late 12th or 13th century, but it was not recovered from a stratified deposit. A bronze finger ring with a rectangular bezel which has lost most of its hoop as well as its stone or glass setting (no. 1616, fig 216) could have been produced at least fifty years before it was discarded in the late 13th century; it is possible, however, that rings of this style may have had a long period of production, just as stirrup-shaped rings did.

The settings of three decorative brass finger rings are individually distinct but the hoops re-semble one another. These are round-sectioned and a seam-line visible round the circumferences of two of them (nos. 1618 & 1620) shows that they were madę from a thin piece of sheet metal, rolled and hammered into its present form. The type of wire thus produced appears to have been used for the making of finger rings in London from at least the first half of the 12th century (Pritch-ard forthcoming), and was also used for other smali accessories.

Among the settings of the three latter rings one with an octagonal bezel is claw-set (no. 1619, fig 216), but even though the four claws remain intact and a white cement was used as an adhe-sive, the stone is missing, perhaps because it got smashed or was re-used. It is the only finger ring catalogued here which has claws and although it was recovered from a late 14th-century deposit (ceramic phase 11) its style suggests that it probably belongs to the 13th century. Compara-ble finger rings with claw-settings madę from precious metal rather than brass include two which were given to St Albans Abbey in the 13th century. One had formerly belonged to Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury (died 1228) and the other to John, Bishop of Ardfert (died 1245) (Oman 1930B, 81-2; Stratford 1984 , 291 no. 318).

The other two brass finger rings have separate collets, each madę from a strip of sheeting, and both retain their stone settings. One is a smali, green cabochon madę from glass with a high lead content with copper added as a colorant (no. 1620, fig 216). No datę could be assigned to the deposit from which it was recovered. The other, from a late 13th or early 14th-century deposit (ceramic phase 9), is a circular press-moulded glass ‘cameo’ with a device of a scorpion or crab (no. 1618, fig 216; colour pl 12A). The long taił and curved outline of the creature point to it being scorpion while its six legs are morę typical of a crab (see, for example, the Chertsey floor tiles c. 1250-70 showing the signs of the zodiac: Eames 1980, 149 and 164, nos. 525 & 573). There appears, however, to be little consistency in form between these two signs in different media. Moulded-glass pastes are otherwise un-known from 13th-century England and it is, therefore, unlikely that it was a canting device commissioned by a Londoner. It may have been wom as a talisman, illustrating the popular in-terest in the magical properties of engraved gems which sprang up in western Europę during the 12th century (Evans 1922, 96), and previously exemplified from England by a gold finger ring, set with a bloodstone intaglio, which was reco-vered from the coffin of a bishop in Chichester Cathedral, and is probably of late 12th-century datę (Stratford 1984, 290-1, no. 314). The 13th-century scholastic, Albert Magnus, in his treatise De Rebus Metallicis extols the virtues of various astrological sigils including the signs of the zodiac (Evans 1922, 97). The choice of a crab or scorpion may, therefore, have been intended to pro-tect the wearer against illness, particularly tertian fever, against which both these sigils were sup-posed to be especially efficacious (Evans 1922, 100). No other ring set with a press-moulded