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ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS give it a firm hold. In this sword, however, the details seem to have been first engraved through this silver coating, and the lines then filled with copper wire ; and the animals' heads which form the pommel are bound with twisted and plaited wires so as to resemble to some extent the heads of horses.^^ The blade is now somewhat decayed, but there was probably a dama- scened inscription near the base of the blade, the name ulfberht preceded by a cross being frequent on swords of this period, which appear to have issued from a single workshop, though the place of manufacture has not yet been precisely determined." First among the ornaments of the Anglo-Saxon period from London may be mentioned the gold finger-ring, of which two views are given on the coloured plate (figs. 2, 4). On general grounds it may be assigned to the ninth century, when native art had outgrown the animal forms of the pagan period, and was not yet pervaded by Irish or Scandinavian influences. This specimen is drawn full-size, and consists of a hoop covered with rows of plaited gold wire, which part into two bands at the front, and there inclose a cruciform filigree pattern, with the angles within and without the oval bezel filled with beading. The cross is equal-armed, and may be nothing but a geometrical ornament ; but it is remarkable that another gold ring precisely of this form has been found at Bossington, Hampshire," with a bust in place of the cross, and the inscription, nomen ehlla fides in christo, which clearly points to Christian ownership. The London specimen probably belonged to an ecclesiastic, and was found in Garrick Street, passing into the British Museum as an item of the Franks Bequest. In the national collection is a bronze disk 1*3 in. in diameter in poor condition, but still retaining evident traces of spiral ornament like that on several escutcheons for hanging-bowls of the Saxon period in England. The enamel has disappeared, but there can be little doubt that the disk with its close-wound spirals filled with red enamel belonged to a set of three (or four) set within frames each surmounted by a hook for the attachment of chains to the edge of a bowl, and a fragment in the same collection from Surrey shows that champleve enamels of this kind were known in this part of England ; in fact Kent has produced more examples than any other county, and the number still in existence can justly be held to prove that the Late Celtic or Early British school of art was not altogether destroyed by four centuries of Roman civilization, but enjoyed a renaissance in this country even when the Teutonic conquest was complete. The significance of these bowls has still to be explained, but the few details known of their discovery point to the sixth or early seventh century. Another possible survival of the Celtic style is a circular bronze brooch from the City (Roach Smith, Catalogue No. 554) with the face embossed with three C-scrolls inclosing S-scrolls and arranged in triskele fashion. The work is rude and lacks the charm of Celtic scroll-work, but a still more debased specimen "* has been found in the Thames, with a gold coin evi- dently copied from a semissis (half-solidus) of Heraclius (610-41) or Constans II (641-68). The brooch is of pewter, nearly i in. in diameter, " Arch. 1, 5 3 1 . " Lorange, Den Yngre Jemalden Svaerd, pL i, ii, iii. " V.C.H. Hants, i, 397 ; Journ. Brit. Arch. Assoc, i, 341. '^ Figured in Lond. and Midd. Arch. Soc. Trans, i, 123 ; see 143. A better example in the Cheapside hoard {Guildhall M us. Cat. pi. liv, fig. 5). 157