Lot 82B
Northern Europe, Viking / Norse culture, ca. 10th century CE. An incredible example of a Jellinge Style (Jelling Style) lunate (penannular) brooch, cast from silver. Gilded, incised shapes that look like drinking horns on either side of the opening for the pin contain low relief motifs. These motifs are both abstract geometric and zoomorphic, depicting tesselated chains and sinuous-bodied serpents with their heads in profile. Five bosses, each composed of a silver ball set into a raised silver inlay, stud each of these drinking horn shapes. The other side of the brooch repeats these shapes and the five bosses in each, but has no animals, just four incised chains connecting the bosses in an "X." The pin is very long and where it wraps around the ring of the brooch it has an incised face of an older man with a long, drooping beard, perhaps representing Thor or Odin. This face is also gilded. Size: 8" L x 3.5" W (20.3 cm x 8.9 cm) Size: 8" L x 3.5" W (20.3 cm x 8.9 cm); 4.65" H (11.8 cm) on included custom stand. 119.1 grams
Norse art is known for its detailed, gorgeous ornamentation of even the most mundane objects (interestingly, the opposite of the IKEA style perpetuated by some of their descendants). The Jellinge style is named after Jelling, Denmark, where a silver cup bearing interlaced, curving animals was found in the royal burial chamber of King Gorm the Old, the first known king of Denmark. The style is designed to look like filigree work, but is cast. It features S-shaped animals whose bodies loop in and around each other, with tendrils snaking off of their limbs and tongues.
The penannular style of brooch was originally created in the Celtic British Isles ca. 600 CE and became popular throughout Scandinavia after the Vikings began to have contact with Celtic peoples around the end of the 8th century CE. Its owner would have pushed the long pin through the folds of his or her wool cloak and then pushed one end of the ring under the sharp end of the pin. The ring was then rotated to hold the pin in place. Whoever commissioned and wore this beautiful silver object would have been a wealthy and powerful member of their community.
This brooch is very similar to one from Ballymoney, Ireland, featured on the BBC's History of the World program: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ahistoryoftheworld/objects/Pml1KpazQ125oG2rKvkgRA (brooch is held in the Ballymoney Town Hall and Museum, who do not have a complete online catalogue).
Provenance: private New York, USA collection
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#123109
- Condition: Slight bending to pin. Patina on surface, with much of the gilt remaining.
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