File:Medieval iron spur (image from deleted record CAM-B8A9D7) (FindID 479884).jpg

English: An incomplete medieval iron rowel spur. The piece represents approximately 90% of one side, and 45% of the other, and although corroded is in relatively good condition. The longer side curves down around the ankle and up again. It has three evenly spaced, perforated circular expansions along its length, and the tightest part of the curve is well towards the front, just behind the first perforated lobe. Between the circular lobes the side is narrower, and where best preserved appears to have had a trapezoidal cross-section with bevelled edges. There is a single similar circular lobe surviving on the shorter side. The internal diameters of the perforations average 3.7mm. Behind the last perforated lobe, as the sides slope up to their junction at the back of the heel, they are D-shaped in cross-section; the junction itself has a pointed top.

A fraction of the longer side's terminal remains, consisting of part of a single loop; the rest, which may have included a second loop, is missing. At the heel point, the circular-section short neck projects backwards, flaring then flattening to a broken rowel box. The rowel is missing.

The whole object is corroded, and has been treated with micro-crystalline wax to help preservation. The object is measures 117.3mm overall in length, the side is 5.8mm thick and 17.7mm wide at the heel point. The neck and rowel box extend 24.6mm,and the overall weight is 30.3g.

Rowel spurs came into use in the 13th century. The curving sides of this spur mean that it must pre-date c. 1500 AD (Ellis in Clark 1995, 127-130). Its distinctive decoration has not yet been paralleled.