Category: Medieval

Magnet fisherman finds Viking sword

Medieval

First of all, there is such a thing as a magnet fisherman: ie, someone who uses a powerful neodymium magnet on a rope to retrieve metal objects from bodies of water. I did not know this. Secondly, magnet fisherman Trevor Penny pulled up an intact Viking sword from the River Cherwell in West Oxfordshire last November.

Magnet fishing usually pulls up relatively modern debris — tire rims, keys, bicycles, unexploded ordnance — not iron swords hundreds of years old. Penny didn’t know what it was at first, but after consulting with friends and knowledgeable acquaintances, he called it in to the Portable Antiquities Scheme finds liaison officer in Standlake. The finds liaison officer identified it as a Viking sword dating to between 850 and 975 A.D. It is the oldest object ever discovered in Oxfordshire by magnet fishing.

It looks like a Petersen Type M to my untutored eye, based on the hilt shaped like a capital I, the long blade and the date range. Type M swords in good condition can retain traces of organic remains (wood, leather, cloth) on the grip, so it’s important that this sword be carefully conserved. It is corroded, but there could be organic treasure hiding underneath that crusty exterior. Thankfully, the sword is already in the hands of museum professionals and will remain there.

Mr Penny confirmed that it will be retained by Oxford museum services and will either stay in Witney or be put on display in a museum.

He added: “There was a little dispute with the landowner and the rivers trust who don’t permit magnet fishing. The latter sent a legal document saying they wouldn’t take action on the condition the sword was passed to a museum, which I had done.”

V&A launches campaign for 12th c. walrus ivory carving

Medieval, Museums

The V&A museum has launched a campaign to raise the £2 million it needs to acquire the rare 12th century walrus ivory carving that will otherwise leave the UK and enter the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The Deposition from the Cross is a depiction of Joseph of Arimathea taking the body of Christ down from the cross. The meticulous detail — the finely striated hair and beards, the soft draping of the robes — make it one of the greatest surviving examples of English Romanesque ivory carving. Thought to have been crafted in York, North Yorkshire, in around 1190, it was originally part of a larger altarpiece with multiple scenes from the Passion of the Christ. Today only this fragment and a much smaller fragment of Judas eating the bread dipped in wine Jesus passed to him marking him as the betrayer, are known to survive from this altarpiece. The V&A already owns the Judas fragment.

The Met bought the carving in a private sale last year but its application for an export license was deferred on the grounds that its exceptionally fine carving and rarity make it a work of national importance. The UK Arts Minister placed a temporary export bar on the Deposition to give a local museum the opportunity to raise the purchase price and keep the carving in the country.

From Tristram Hunt, Director of the V&A:

“The Deposition from the Cross ivory is one of the most beautiful, entrancing and historically important items to have been on display at the V&A. It tells the story of humanism long before the Renaissance, and speaks to an elemental part of English culture. It is vital that we return it to display, for free, for everyone, forever.”

Why does this object belong at the V&A?

The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest have stated that the Deposition from the Cross is ‘one of the most culturally and aesthetically significant objects’ they have ever considered, and that this important work is of eminent importance for providing vital insights into a period of English history, from which very few objects have survived. The successful acquisition of the Deposition from the Cross by the V&A would allow for the sculpture to be re-united with the only known surviving piece of the same ensemble, a fragmentary ivory carving of Judas at the Last Supper, discovered in Wakefield during the 18th-century, which is currently in the V&A Collection.

The two pieces were on display together at the V&A from 1982 until 2022. The Deposition was on long-term loan, and was only removed from the museum when the owner decided to sell it.

The V&A has set up a donation button at the bottom of the page here. You check out with a credit card or PayPal just like buying something from the museum’s online store.

“Vanished church” found under Venice’s iconic Piazza San Marco

Medieval

The remains of San Geminiano, the “vanished church” that moved around Piazza San Marco in Venice for centuries before its final destruction in 1807, have been discovered under the iconic main square. So far archaeologists have discovered pieces of the medieval pavements and walls and a brick tomb containing the skeletal remains of seven people. The tomb dates to the 7th or 8th century, predating construction of Piazza San Marco itself.

Tradition has it that the first San Geminiano church was built by order of the Byzantine general Narses in the mid-6th century A.D. in appreciation of Venice’s contributions to his reconquest of Ravenna. Saint Mark the Evangelist wasn’t even the patron of Venice then (Saint Theodore was), so there was no Piazza San Marco. For that matter, there weren’t even any doges until the 8th century, and it was only in the 9th century, after the relics of St. Mark were smuggled out of Abbasid-ruled Alexandria in a basket filled with pork by Venetian merchants, that Mark became the city’s new patron.

The Church of San Geminiano burned down in 976 and a new one built in the first decade of the 11th century. That one burned and collapsed after an earthquake in around 1108. The reconstructed church was then demolished in the late 12th century to accommodate the expansion of Piazza San Marco. It was relocated to another location on the newly-expanded Piazza. The 12th century church was demolished in the early 16th century and the new one relocated again. This last one would stand until 1807 when it was demolished by Napoleon to make way for a new wing of the long colonnaded buildings that embrace three sides of the piazza.

With all its movement, the exact locations of the original church and its immediate descendants were lost. Archaeologists unearthed the ruins in the center of the Piazza while working on the restoration of its paving stones. The brick tomb emerged first, then the wall and paving remnants. The excavation is now complete and the remains will be analyzed in the lab while the piazza’s paving stones are returned to their place over the early Christian remains of Venice.

Rare Merovingian gold ring found in Jutland

Medieval, Treasures

A metal detectorist has discovered a rare Merovingian gold ring dating to 500-600 A.D. in Emmerlev, Southwest Jutland, Denmark. The ring is made of 22-carat gold and is set with an oval cabochon almandine garnet, a red semi-precious stone prized among Germanic peoples as a symbol of power. The mount has four spirals on the underside and trefoil knobs where the band meets the bezel. The spirals and knobs are characteristic of the highest quality of Frankish manufacture, and rings of this type were worn by the elite of the Merovingian dynasty.

National Museum of Denmark curator Kirstine Pommergaard believes the quality and construction of the ring suggests there may have been an unknown noble family in the Emmerlev area with close connections to Merovingian royalty.

“The gold ring not only reveals a possible new princely family in Emmerlev, but also connects the area with one of Europe’s largest centers of power in the Iron Age. The gold ring is probably a woman’s ring and may have belonged to a prince’s daughter who was married to a prince in Emmerlev. Gold was typically reserved for diplomatic gifts, and we know that people married into alliances, just it probably happened with Thyra and Gorm the Old and in more recent times when Christian IX became known as ‘Europe’s father-in-law’ for marrying his daughters into other royal houses, ” she says.

Archaeologists do not think the ring was at that location because it was lost on the way to somewhere else. Almost a thousand ancient and medieval artifacts (gold and silver trade coins, textiles, pottery) have been found at Emmerlev, evidence that busy international trade was taking place there for centuries. The trading post of Ribe was just 30 miles north of Emmerlev, an important stop in the lucrative trade network of the Wadden Sea region.

Gold and silver coins in the Emmerlev area confirm Merovingian contact, and the Merovingian kings and merchants did trade through the Wadden Sea network to Ribe. Making a marriage alliance with a Southern Jutland potentate would therefore have been highly advantageous to provide them with safe harbor and local influence.

The find was actually made in 2020, but the discovery of the ring has been kept under wraps until now to allow metal detectorists and archaeologists to explore the site without unwanted attention.The finder, Lars Nielsen, turned the ring in to the Museum Sønderjylland when he found it, and the local museum has now transferred it to the National Museum in Copenhagen.

”We’ve never seen anything like it out here. Many discoveries have been made over time that point to global trade connections at the Wadden Sea. The gold ring substantiates that there has also been an elite who have had something to do with music. Not everyone has had contact with the Merovingians, ” says Anders Hartvig, museum curator at Museum Sønderjylland.

Kirstine Pommergaard adds:

“The Merovingians were interested in entering into a network with families and individuals who could control trade and resources in an area. “Perhaps the princely family in Emmerlev had control over an area between Ribe and Hedeby and thus secured trade in the area,” she says.

Medieval love token found under Gdańsk port crane

Medieval, Museums

A tin turtle dove badge from the Middle Ages has been discovered during renovations of the 600-year-old Gdańsk port crane. The love token features a turtle dove perched on a banner inscribed “Amor Vincit Omnia,” meaning “love conquers all.” The badge originally had two loops on the back, now broken off, from which it would have been threaded on a chain or on a pin. These types of tokens were popular in the 14th and 15th centuries, a fashion imported from the west as similar pieces have been found in the Netherlands and Britain.

The love token was unearthed during work on the foundations of the Gdańsk Crane, a marvel of medieval technology and of historic preservation. The oldest surviving port crane in Europe, it was built between 1442 and 1444. The crane is a wooden structure between two three-story brick towers over the Motława river and was the largest water gate in Gdańsk. It was heavily defended, with cannon on the ground floor and openings in the upper stories for small arms to fire through.

The crane was used to raise heavy loads (cargo, masts for ship construction) to and from the water. It was powered by a mechanism of four human-powered treadmill wheels more than 20 feet in diameter on a common shaft. When all four wheels were employed, it could hoist cargo weighing up to two tons more than 80 feet high. Each treadwheel was operated by four men walking like hamsters. While its importance to trade and shipbuilding was already in decline in the 18th century, it was still being used in 1944. Much of it burned in 1945 and was reconstructed in the late 1950s and 1960s.

The crane is part of the National Maritime Museum in Gdańsk today, but has been closed to visitors since 2020 while the building undergoes the largest renovation project since its reconstruction after it took heavy damage during World War II. This time the focus was on historical accuracy and conserving the surviving original elements like the 1688 sundial on the southern tower. The monument, an icon of the city, has a newly clean brick façade and a new roof covered in ceramic tiles imported from Italy. The wooden crane housing looks completely different. Before the renovation it was black; now it has been repainted a warm brown that matches its appearance in depictions from centuries ago.

The interior has also been restored and updated with six rooms on the three stories of the Crane that will display Gdańsk’s mercantile history. Visitors will learn about the navigation of the port, how business was transacted by merchants and customs agents, shipbuilding techniques, the home life and downtime of Gdańsk’s residents. New recreations of historic spaces — a merchant’s office, a tavern and a bedroom in a burgher’s house — will give visitors a look at how people lived and worked in 17th century Gdańsk. And get this, the rooms will all have holographic guides, 3D moving holograms of a customs official, an innkeeper and a fictional composite of a merchant and shipowner named Hans Kross. How Star Trek is that? “Please state the nature of your mercantile emergency.”

The Gdańsk Crane is scheduled to reopen April 30th, 2024. The turtle dove love token, currently undergoing cleaning and conservation, will be on display in the renovated museum space when it opens.