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REVIEW BY TIM PESTELL
Only a handful of British archaeological sites can be truly described as iconic, but Snettisham in Norfolk has a strong claim, having become synonymous with the presence and hoarding there of Iron Age torcs. The questions of exactly how these pieces of jewellery were used and why this one site saw such prodigious quantities buried provide some of the themes addressed in this imposing pair of volumes, recently published by the British Museum. The publication is tremendously handsome, running to over 700 pages with full colour illustrations throughout. This is, then, not a light bedtime read but one to pay, like the torcs chronicled within, due reverence to.
The report is divided into three principal parts: first, examining the site; second, the substantial work on the actual torcs and coins in the hoards; and, third, the discussion, actually broken down into another series of chapters. Unsurprisingly, the catalogue of material recovered from the site since the first discoveries in 1948 is a substantial work in its own right. Here we find descriptions of the reconstructed minimum number of 350 multi-strand and 50 tubular torcs from the site, 60 of which are near complete. This concentration can be appreciated best when considered against the 85 similar torcs known from the rest of the UK and in the context that Snettisham is the largest assemblage of prehistoric jewellery from anywhere in Europe.
One of the most joyous discoveries mentioned in the book, and testament to the British Museum Conservation department’s crucial work on the hoard, was the realisation that the copper-alloy ‘bowl’ used to contain Hoard F was in fact a helmet with surviving fragments of nasal guard, brows, and cheekpiece hinges. Details like piercings in the ear areas are especially appealing, and its use in a ritual context recalls the Hallaton Roman helmet, providing another bridge to wider Iron Age votive practice. The discovery of field maple, alder, and hazel rod remains around which wires were coiled to create multi-strand torcs, and the surface enrichment or mercury gilding of wires (the earliest recorded use in Britain) to emphasise particular metal colours, are yet more pearls to have emerged.
Snettisham, we are also reminded, not only has the largest number of Iron Age torcs in Europe, but one of the densest concentrations anywhere of items decorated with Celtic art. Following the heroically diligent cataloguing of the mass of sometimes tiny fragments, we see the particular strengths and research interests of the two principal authors (modestly labelled ‘editors’ on the title page, in addition to another 27 contributors) come to the fore in Section III. Torcs, Celtic art, and notions of hoarding are discussed in substantial detail. Given the huge preceding catalogue, I was mildly amused by the comment (p.562) that the focus on torcs as ‘art’ objects has led to their fetishisation, with discussion in exquisite detail about questions of date, parallels, and manufacture. Yet it is tacitly acknowledged that these must also be the foundations on which we are able to build other, theoretically derived, models to view people, place, and lived experience.
Perhaps, therefore, my only disappointment was the discussion about ‘why Snettisham?’. It may be that the site moved from a ‘torc-deposition’ place to one of ‘coin deposition’, potentially tied to underlying social changes in power dynamics; or that Snettisham took on wider prominence as such a torc-deposition site once the practice there had become established. What is not brought out adequately is the wider archaeological position of Snettisham within Late Iron Age Norfolk or eastern England, nor its relationship to the Iceni – for example, the huge ritual complex at Fison Way Thetford is not even mentioned.
Such grumbles might be those of a naturally biased Norfolk museum curator. What is clear is that this exhaustive and triumphant presentation provides the basis for all new work into torcs as objects and with Snettisham as its focus. As the editors sign off in their acknowledgements, the site surely has many more secrets left to reveal and a better understanding of the wider dirt archaeology will arguably be the next logical step.
The Snettisham Hoards (British Museum Research Publication 225)
Julia Farley and Jody Joy (eds)
British Museum (£40 per volume)
ISBN 978-0861592258
