Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 November 2011
Ring-brooches, which probably were a Celtic invention, started as very simple objects. They consisted of an open ring and a pin ending in a loop which could move along the ring. As ornaments they were not very showy, as their only decoration lay in the shape of their terminals, but as dress-fasteners they were no doubt practical. They seem, however, to have had one drawback: when the ring was too thin or made of poor metal the terminals could be wrenched apart and the brooch could be twisted out of shape when roughly handled. That this possibility existed can be concluded from one of its subsequent developments: the penannular brooch was sometimes turned into an annular one.
page 18 note 1 Fowler, Elisabeth, ‘The Origin and Develop-merit of the Penannular Brooch in Europe’, Proc. Preh. Soc. (1960), p. 171Google Scholar.
page 18 note 2 Hampel, J., Altertümer des frühen Mittelalters in Ungarn (1905), i, 290Google Scholar, 694, 695; iii, pl. 175, 9, 10.
page 18 note 3 Mainzer Ztschr. (1917), p. 60, fig. 26, 3; Germania (1938), p. 115, fig. 1,4; H. Dannheimer, German. Funde in Mittelfranken (1962), pl. 3, 4; pl. 20, 11; Der röm. Limes in Osterreich, ix (1908), 78, fig. 37, 5.
page 19 note 1 See for instance ibid, xvii (1933), 140, fig. 64. Here griffins' heads are used instead of bulls'.
page 19 note 2 Strena Buličiana (1924), p. 248, where the motif is used as a tailpiece. In Intercisa, a Roman town in Pannonia Inferior, an almost identical specimen was found in a man's grave: Arch. hung. (1954), pl. xxv, 1 and p. 97. It evidently dates from the late Roman period.
page 19 note 3 Archäol. Anzeiger (1943), p. 461, fig. 6.
page 20 note 1 Jenny, , von, , >Zur Herkunft des Trompetenorna-ments, IPEK, 1935, p. 344Zur+Herkunft+des+Trompetenorna-ments,+IPEK,+1935,+p.+344>Google Scholar s.
page 19 note 2 Kloiber, A., Die Gräberfelder von Lauriacum, 1962Google Scholar (Forsch. in Lauriacum 8), p. 63, fig. 2.
page 19 note 3 Ibid., p. 85.
page 19 note 4 Leeds, Thurlow, Early Anglo-Saxon Art and Archaeology (1936)Google Scholar, pl. llc. The type with the inner penannular ring is only represented by one other specimen: pl. iiia. A third one, pl. iib, although considered a member of the quoit family, is of a different type.
page 21 note 1 Leeds, op. cit., p. 7: ‘There is every reason to believe they are objects antedating the invasion.’
page 21 note 2 Hawkes, Sonia, Archaeologia, xcviii (1961), 53Google Scholar: ‘There can be no doubt that the broad quoit, or annular, brooch is a new development which does not occur before Anglo-Saxon times.’