{"id":343,"date":"2025-04-10T08:26:21","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T07:26:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/?p=343"},"modified":"2025-04-10T13:41:51","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T12:41:51","slug":"winchester-the-brooks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/2025\/04\/10\/winchester-the-brooks\/","title":{"rendered":"Winchester The Brooks"},"content":{"rendered":"

As we have seen in previous posts, some hoards are found during archaeological excavations meaning we have a bit more background on the nature of their discovery and wider context. The Winchester Brooks hoard was found during excavations in the centre of Winchester in the 1990s. The hoard had been buried in a small rubbish pit dug near the outside wall of a building which appears to have fell into disrepair by the end of the fourth century. <\/span>The hoard<\/span> consists of a variety of artefacts including coins, spoon fragments and beads but it may survive incomplete since the upper fills of the pit were removed quickly by excavators before it became apparent that the contents of the hoard were scattered amongst the layers. <\/span>The hoard has not been published or examined\u00a0in detail since its discovery and the team were excited to visit <\/span>Hampshire Cultural Trust<\/span><\/a> to study its contents.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Selection of coral (left) and green glass beads from the hoard (Photo: \u00a9 University of Kent)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Winchester Brooks hoard <\/span>included about 160 scattered beads which <\/span>probably comprised<\/span> a single necklace, as one copper alloy hook-and-eye fastener was also found. Most beads were glass, in a variety of shapes and colours, though there were a few coral and amber beads too \u2013 some green glass biconical beads and coral long cylinder beads are shown in the photographs. Mixed necklaces including a variety of glass beads together with those in other materials are typical of the end of the Roman period, continuing in the fifth century and later. Coral beads are <\/span>relatively uncommon<\/span> in Britain but do occur in some of our other hoards too. There, they are found with silver rather than copper alloy necklace clasps, <\/span>representing<\/span> at least two complete coral bead necklaces. The coral beads in the Winchester Brooks hoard <\/span>probably originally<\/span> came from such a necklace. The inclusion on the Winchester necklace of small numbers of many <\/span>different types<\/span> of beads, including the coral ones, suggests the curation of beads from broken strings where most of the beads have been lost. The beads may have been treasured heirlooms, although the necklace could also have been <\/span>purchased<\/span> from a merchant who collected and recycled beads of <\/span>various types<\/span>.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The 87 or so coins are mostly base metal and survive in a poor condition<\/span> making it quite a challenge to <\/span>identify<\/span> the <\/span>different types<\/span>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>Of those <\/span>that were <\/span>identifiable, m<\/span>ost <\/span>date to the <\/span>middle of the fourth century <\/span>(c. 348-364 CE)<\/span> and <\/span>a high proportion of these coins <\/span>were<\/span>\u00a0also copies.<\/span> C<\/span>oins minted later in the fourth century are far fewer in number<\/span> and<\/span> the single <\/span><\/span>siliqua<\/span><\/span> of Honorius (395-402 CE) <\/span>is <\/span>perhaps the<\/span> most interesting <\/span>find<\/span>.<\/span> Like the base metal coins, t<\/span>he <\/span>sil<\/span>iqua <\/span>is <\/span>also <\/span>in a poor <\/span>condition<\/span> and you might not<\/span> notice that the coin has been pierced when you look at the image below (it has!)<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>The coin was <\/span>probably repurposed<\/span> as a pendant for the<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>necklace<\/span>\u00a0and the location of the piercing suggests that the reverse of the coin depicting Roma seated left on a cuirass holding a Victory on globe was displayed by the wearer. More widely, t<\/span>here <\/span>aren\u2019t<\/span> huge numbers<\/span> of pierced <\/span><\/span>siliqua<\/span><\/span> finds from Britain<\/span>, <\/span>though several stray finds are recorded by the <\/span>PAS<\/span> and they are found in a few other hoards.<\/span> B<\/span>oth the<\/span> Bowerchalke<\/span><\/a> and Milman Road I<\/span> hoard<\/span>s<\/span> also<\/span> contained<\/span> pierced <\/span>silver <\/span>coin<\/span>s, for example,<\/span> though their reuse in jewellery is not as clear as the Winchester Brooks example.<\/span> <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Pierced silver coin (Photo: \u00a9 Trustees of the British Museum)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As we have seen in previous posts, some hoards are found during archaeological excavations meaning we have a bit more background on the nature of … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83068,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[305568,304923],"tags":[308639],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83068"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=343"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":419,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343\/revisions\/419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/hoards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}