STRAP FITTING 136519

Description: An incomplete copper alloy sword belt fitting dating to the 16th/ 17th century and consisting of just over half of the plate with two (out of an original three) surviving suspension loops (which would ahve been attached to the belt) and two of the hooked plates (one of which consists of a loop only, the other is whole) which would have attached to the sword. The plate with the suspension loops is 43.2mm long (originally would have been c.74mm), and has a 2mm diameter piercing at the centre and another at the surviving end, for attachment purposes. On the reverse these piercings are sunken. To the front, the plate has foliate decoration. The surviving end is tri-lobed, the outer two decorated as leaves extending from two stems (with leaves on the outer edges) that fill the rest of the plate, joining in one leaf just before the centre, where six leaves radiate from the central piercing. The surving plate (c.2mm thick) with hook has the same foliate design, two branches with leaves on the external edge beneath the hook joining along the centre of the plate (at the base of which is a 2mm diameter piercing) and spreading out at the other end, around another 2mm diameter piercing surrounded by one large leaf. The loop in contrast is quite chunky and oval in section. This plate measures 49.8mm. The 'drop' of the object is c.72mm. It weighs 23.10g. Ref. Read, Metal Artefacts of Antiquity 2001, p.43, fig.26, no.373 from West Somerset.

Date: 1501 - 1700

Object type: STRAP FITTING

Last import: August 15, 2017