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Auction: 15006 - Ancient, Islamic, British and Foreign Coins and Commemorative Medals
Lot: 369

Hiberno-Scandinavian Kings of York, Penny, 1.11g, St Peter sword type, 921-7, transitional hammer/mallet variety, York, sc¯iifi / iiio in two lines, divided by sword placed horizontally across field, pommel to the left and with pellets above and below handle, cross below legend, rev. +[...], voided mallet head with solid bar handle (Blackburn VCCBI, II, p.37-8; N.556/7; S.1015/6), a deeply patinated and uncleaned field find with earth deposits, small area of flan loss above legend and single peck mark in field, clearly deliberately rolled prior to deposition for use as a votive offering, the host coin probably nearly very fine and an extremely rare transitional type but the item more important as an artefact of contextual and historical significance

provenance:
Found Great Sturton, Lincolnshire, 2015
Recorded with the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, ref. EMC 2015.0058

This piece serves as an intriguing insight into the cultural and religious contexts of the Danelaw in the first half of the 10th century. The fusing of Christian and Pagan imagery on the contemporary coinage conveys how the Scandinavian settlers amalgamated different beliefs. In that context the current piece can be seen; the bending and deposition of a penny in an overtly religious act as a votive offering. Any precipitating factors for the deposition are lost to antiquity but it may have been to give thanks for victory in battle or perhaps in the hope of achieving a healthy crop.

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Sold for
£500