Norway’s largest known Viking Age hoard found
Analysis of two votive offering vessels from Pompeii is enhancing our understanding of Roman domestic rituals.
hacksilver
Llanbedrgoch: Exploring a unique early medieval trading centre on Anglesey
Ninth-century Carolingian coins from the reigns of Louis the Pious and Charles the Bald are not the sort of objects you would expect to find on a remote farm on the Isle of Anglesey, so, when metal-detectorists began reporting these and other exceptional artefacts from the early medieval period, the National Museum of Wales (now Amgueddfa Cymru) sent Mark Redknap, then Curator of Medieval and Later Archaeology, to investigate. Between 1994 and 2012, Mark led ten seasons of fieldwork on the site, revealing the remains of a trading settlement with a form unparalleled in Wales. With the full report recently published, Chris Catling describes its key findings.
Silver beyond Empire: Offering a new perspective on the late Roman to early medieval transition
Over the last 15 years, international research focused on a series of silver hoards and other finds from the late Roman and early medieval periods has shed new light
on how this metal was used and viewed during a period of great cultural change.
Dr Alice Blackwell, Dr Fraser Hunter, Dr Andreas Rau, and Dr Martin Goldberg report.
Rediscovering a forgotten power centre
Archaeological investigations at a site in the Norwegian countryside have uncovered evidence of a rich history stretching back thousands of years. Amy Brunskill spoke to Jes Martens and Christian Løchsen Rødsrud, who led the research, to find out more.
This week: Roman silver
Back in 1919, when the spectacular Traprain Hoard was unearthed at an Iron Age hillfort outside Edinburgh, it must have been tempting to view this unmatched assemblage of Late Roman ‘hacksilver’ (silver items and objects which have deliberately been cut,…
Piecing together the puzzle: understanding the Late Roman hacksilver from the Traprain Hoard
Excavation work at Traprain Law, an Iron Age hillfort in East Lothian, some 30km east of Edinburgh, was interrupted by the turmoil of the First World War. Two weeks after work began again on 12 May 1919, George Pringle loosened the soil with the tip of his pick and pulled out a Roman silver vessel. This was the first artefact to be found from what would prove to be the largest hoard yet known of Late Roman hacksilver – silver which has been chopped, cut, and crushed. More than a century later, an equally massive 784-page study has been published that tells us what the hoard represents in terms of the art and lifestyles of people from both sides of Hadrian’s Wall, as Chris Catling reports.
A Viking Market Kingdom in Ireland and Britain: trade networks and the importation of a southern Scandinavian silver bullion economy
This book is the third in Routledge’s ‘Archaeologies of the Viking World’ series, and maintains the high standard of the others in terms of content. The book’s core idea is that groups with connections to southern Scandinavia established an often-loose…
UK museum news Spring 2022
The latest on acquisitions, exhibitions, and key decisions.
JORVIK Viking Centre to exhibit Silverdale Hoard
The spectacular hoard was unearthed near Silverdale, North Lancashire, by metal-detectorist Darren Webster in 2011.
Solving a silver jigsaw: a new hoard of Roman hacksilver from Fife
Recently discovered in Fife, the Dairsie Hoard represents the earliest-known evidence found outside the empire for Roman use of hacksilver to secure their frontiers. Fraser Hunter unpicks its illuminating and ornate contents.
Scotland’s Early Silver
For centuries Scotland’s finely crafted silver brooches, neck chains, vessels, and more were made from a supply of Roman hacksilver. Lucia Marchini learns more about the medieval afterlife of this metal at the National Museum of Scotland’s new exhibition.