ship set adrift in the North Sea overflowing with arms and armor
and costly adornments:
They laid their dear lord, the giver of rings, deep within the ship by
the mast in majesty; many treasures and adornments from far and
wide were gathered there. I have never heard of a ship equipped
more handsomely with weapons and war-gear, swords and corselets;
on his breast lay countless treasures that were to travel far with him
into the waves’ domain.^2
In 1939, archaeologists uncovered a treasure-laden ship in a
burial mound at Sutton Hoo, near the sea, in Suffolk, England. Al-
though the Sutton Hoo ship was not sent out to sea, it epitomizes the
early medieval tradition of burying great lords in ships with rich fur-
nishings, as recorded in Beowulf.Among the many precious finds
were a gold belt buckle, 10 silver bowls, a silver plate with the impe-
rial stamp of the Byzantine emperor Anastasius I (r. 491–518), and
40 gold coins (perhaps to pay the 40 oarsmen who would row the
deceased across the sea on his final voyage). Also placed in the ship
were two silver spoons inscribed “Saulos” and “Paulos,” Saint Paul’s
names in Greek before and after his baptism. They may allude to a
conversion to Christianity. Some historians have associated the site
with the East Anglian king Raedwald (r. 599?–625), who was bap-
tized a Christian before his death in 625, but the identity of the king
buried at Sutton Hoo is uncertain.
Most extraordinary of all the Sutton Hoo finds is a purse cover
(FIG. 16-3) decorated with cloisonné plaques. The cloisonné tech-
nique, a favorite of the early medieval “treasure givers,” is documented
at least as early as the New Kingdom in Egypt. Metalworkers produced
cloisonné jewelry by soldering small metal strips, or cloisons (French
for “partitions”), edge up, to a metal background, and then filling thecompartments with semiprecious stones, pieces of colored glass, or
glass paste fired to resemble sparkling jewels. The edges of the cloi-
sons are an important part of the design. Cloisonné is a cross be-
tween mosaic (see “Mosaics,” Chapter 11, page 303) and stained
glass (see “Stained-Glass Windows,” Chapter 18, page 472), but me-
dieval artists used it only on a miniature scale.
On the Sutton Hoo purse cover, four symmetrically arranged
groups of figures make up the lower row. The end groups consist of
a man standing between two beasts. He faces front, and they appear
in profile. This heraldic type of grouping has a venerable heritage in
the ancient world (FIG. 2-10,right), but must have delivered a pow-
erful contemporary message. It is a pictorial parallel to the epic sagas
of the era in which heroes like Beowulf battle and conquer horrific
monsters. The two center groups represent eagles attacking ducks.
The animal figures are cunningly composed. For example, the con-
vex beaks of the eagles (compare the Merovingian fibulae,FIG. 16-2)
fit against the concave beaks of the ducks. The two figures fit to-
gether so snugly that they seem at first to be a single dense abstract
design. This is true also of the man-animals motif.
Above these figures are three geometric designs. The outer ones
are purely linear, although they also rely on color contrasts for their
effect. In the central design, an interlace pattern, the interlacements
evolve into writhing animal figures. Elaborate intertwining linear
patterns are characteristic of many times and places, notably in the
art of the Islamic world (see Chapter 13). But the combination of in-
terlace with animal figures was uncommon outside the realm of the
early medieval warlords. In fact, metalcraft with interlace patterns
and other motifs beautifully integrated with the animal form was,
without doubt, the premier art of the early Middle Ages in western
Europe. Interest in it was so great that artists imitated the colorfulArt of the Warrior Lords 40916-3Purse cover, from the Sutton Hoo ship burial in Suffolk, England, ca. 625. Gold, glass, and cloisonné garnets, 7–^12 long. British Museum,
London.
This purse cover is one of many treasures found in a ship beneath a royal burial mound. The combination of abstract interlace ornament with animal
figures is the hallmark of early medieval art in western Europe.1 in.16-3ABelt
buckle, Sutton
Hoo, ca. 625.