Large Scandinavian Viking Silver Filigree Lunate Pendant

Substantial hoop with coiled ends forming the bezel. 4.31 grams, 22.21 mm overall, 18.97 mm internal diameter (approximate size British N, USA 6 1/2, Europe 13.72, Japan 13)



Acquired 1970-2010. Collection of a late Japanese gentleman.

Composed of a convex cutting edge, tapering cheeks with bearded lower edge and an oval-shaped socket with lozengiform flanges and roughly rectangular extensions to the butt, hole inside the blade. 567 grams, 15.5 cm



Acquired 1971-1972. From the collection of the vendor's father. Property of a London, UK, collector.

Iron axeheads of this typology, diffused especially in the regions of the Baltic Sea where they were imported from Scandinavia, show a sub-trapezoidal asymmetrical blade, often perforated through the centre. They are characterised by two projections spurs from the top and the bottom of the back of the shaft-hole.

Adorned with granule clusters to the sidewall and a granulated cross to convex base. 1.40 grams, 14 mm



From the collection of a North American gentleman, formed in the 1990s.

Pendants in the form of miniature buckets have been found in a number of pagan Anglo-Saxon and Viking contexts and are generally made of bronze or iron, with gold examples being rare; three gold examples were found with the hoard from Hoen, Norway. Bronze bucket amulets have been found at Driffield in Yorkshire, and Vimose bog in Denmark, among other places. In form they represent wooden buckets bound with bronze or iron bands which have been found in Anglo-Saxon and Viking graves and are believed to have held mead or ale and were used to replenish the cups from which warriors drank. As amulets they probably represent the ecstatic power of alcoholic drink and the role of women as the dispensers of these precious beverages.