- Chapter Twenty-One -
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.. _ -emsFigure 21.9 Openwork leather shoe. Sixth-seventh century AD; 23.5 cm long. (Alcock et al.
1989:^21 9.)
the fifth-seventh centuries AD was brought more within the orbit of early Christian
scholarly life, and we can see the Lindisfarne scriptorium as a working unit, where
the master Eadfrith produced the Lindisfarne Gospels in the early eighth century
(Bruce-Mitford 1989: 184-6). Eadfrith by his name was no Celt; yet the Celtic and
Saxon traditions can be seen cheek by jowl in symbols and craft traditions already
on the Sutton Hoo hanging-bowls (Bruce-Mitford 1972: 85-6). Nearby, at Burgh,
was Irish missionary influence and surely there must have been also an eclectic atelier
that could use both garnet and millefiori settings and produce the jewelry and hanging-
bowls and their escutcheon settings, so deeply eloquent of old Celtic tradition.
The material evidence seems only rarely to reveal the occupation of a Celt (but
note Sopron, Hungary; Piggott 1965: 197-9), though we may learn the profession of
the bearer of the Obermenzing sword (Figure 30:3, from a grave in a small family
cemetery of the third century Be near Munich), who was a medical man with many
specialized implements implying up-to-the-minute contact with Alexandrian prac-
tice (de Navarro 1955; Moscati et at. 1991: 269, 372-3). Celtic artists sometimes had
an intellectual bent, as shown for instance by the sense of space into which the water-
birds rise obliquely, created by the workers of the Wandsworth shield roundel
in the second century Be Gope 1978: 54, pI. 7; Jope and Jacobsthal in press:
pI. 68-70), or the wit of the Aylesford pantomime horses Gope 1983), or the esoteric
designs on British mirror-backs Gope 1987: 106-10). Celtic intellectual independence
is well shown by the Coligny calendar, of the second century Be (Moscati et at. 1991:
25,494-5)·
And what of the standing of art workers themselves in Celtic society? Many
would be no more than artisans, but a few had held a more special place. Moneyers
could name themselves on their coins, for fiscal purposes. For a time a swordsmith
(or his workshop) was marking KORISIOS (in Greek letters) at the head of the blade
(Megaw 1971: 191-2, nos. 190-3). Rarely, a brooch-maker might give his name, and
a skillet-maker gives a very Celtic name BODVOGENUS in the early first century
AD (Toynbee 1964: 320, pI. LXXV). A bronzeworker might in the second century AD
even take part alongside the patrons in presentation of a work (Toynbee 1962: 13 I,
pI. 19, no. 16). And with some of the finer, wittier pieces (e.g. Figure 21.2; Megaw