File:Early-medieval asymmetric brooch (FindID 98542).jpg

English: Early Saxon incomplete gilded copper alloy Asymmetric brooch (25 x 40mm). To one side of the bow is a broken rectangular terminal with remains of beaded border around chip-carved decoration. The chip-carving consists of two triangular panels, that closest to the bow smaller than the other, separated by a ridge and set within a serrated border line.

The terminal at the other end of the bow is triangular with a rounded moulding at each corner, that at apex with two transverse incised lines indicating a collar. The edge of the terminal has a raised border all around, with punched dots or tiny annulets along the upper horizontal edge (closer to the bow). There is another dot which appears to survive close to the lower collared knop, raising the possibility that the lower long edges of the border have worn or been trimmed away. Within this border is a V-shaped field outlined in relief by a border groove. Both arms of the V contain a raised serrated central line and one contains an additional plain parallel ridge. At the apex of the V is a raised lozenge with traces of delicate incised median line flanked by oblique incised lines in herringbone fashion.

A tapering arched bow joins the two terminals, triangular in cross-section and decorated along both edges with semi-circular ring-and-dot motifs. There are punched dots in zig-zag lines on the sides of the bow and a flat strip down the centre. The pointed ends of the bow fit in with the triangular panels on the rectangular terminal and the inner angle of the V on the triangular terminal.

On the reverse of the triangular terminal is a broken perforated lug and on the rectangular terminal is a broken catch-plate, indicating that the brooch has been illustrated upside down (the composite photograph shows it with lug uppermost and catchplate below. Breaks not recent.

See an almost identical pair from 'near Beauvais', now in the Ashmolean Museum (MacGregor 1997, 137, no.66.1), also illustrated upside down; and a silver-gilt pair from Tournai (St.-Brice), Belgium, gr. 6, that have semi-circular rather than triangular head-plates, but similar rectangular feet. They were found with a mould-blown glass bowl with a chi-rho on the base and a pottery jug (R. Brulet, 1990, Les fouilles du quartier Saint-Brice a Tournai, Louvain-la-Neuve, pl. 5: 6, 3). The type of bowl is mainly dated to the late 5th century, although may have continued into the 6th. The main article on these brooches is in Antiquités Nationales, 29 (1997), 231 ff, where they are dated to the late 5th century.