Brennan and Caoilfhionn's Ducal Challenge-Settmour Swamp's Baronial A&S Championship

I entered Settmour Swamp's Baronial A&S Championship and was honored to have been chosen as the Barony's A&S Champion. This is my documentation:

Trade and Commerce of Glass Beads in Early Medieval Ireland

Purpose

To reproduce and to study the history and social context of glass beads imported to Ireland and native Irish glass beads exported from Ireland as well as the possible trade and commerce of beads within Ireland.

Native and Imported Beads in Ireland

Glass beads have been found at numerous excavation sites across Ireland including settlement sites (i.e. a site where a group of people lived for a period of time), Royal sites, Ecclesiastical sites, and less often cemetery sites. Irish Archaeologist, Dr. Margaret (Mags) Mannion divided the beads into those imported into Ireland and those native to Ireland. She created a standardized classification system to compare these insular (Irish) beads in 18 different Classes. The imported Roman, Frankish, Anglo-Saxon, Viking, German, and Merovingian beads were then matched by Mannion to those found in excavations in their countries of origin. Imported beads are more prevalent at sites where other imported goods were found, especially sites with glass (e.g. vessels) and pottery (e.g. Lagore Crannóg and Garryduff and Garranes Ringforts). These imported beads indicate that Irish society connected with Anglo-Saxon England and Continental Europe. Mannion suspects that Irish bead makers may have incorporated their styles into their own bead making. Given the number of certain types of imported beads (i.e., Guido Schedule 2 xi and 6 xi) it is believed by Hencken (cited in Mannion, 2015, p. 30)  that the Irish bead makers may have then reproduced them.

Exported Irish Beads

In addition to glass beads having been imported into Ireland, Irish beads are also considered to have been exported to other countries. For instance a bead with a spiral decoration known to be native to Ireland (i.e., Mannion’s Class 9) was found at the 2001 Kaupang in Vesthold excavation (i.e. modern Norway). Nåsman (cited in Mannion, 2015, p.10) believes that the Reticella beads (i.e. decorated with blue and white cables and a red band) typically thought to be Scandinavian in origin such as those found at Ribe, Denmark may be of “Celtic insular origin”. Blue and white are the most prominent colors seen in native Irish beads. The Irish Class 10 Herringbone beads were also made with blue and

white cables. The first contact between the Scandinavians and the Irish is mid-9^th century and the earliest Scandinavian graves in Dublin are dated at 837 AD. The Irish were making a variety of glass beads well before the Vikings came to Ireland (Wallace 2008, p. 176). Though the Vikings introduced ideas, art and goods into Ireland, the Vikings also adopted items that were native to Ireland such as the Irish ringed pin and the plain stick pin which was developed later. The use of ringed pins has been found across other Scandinavian settlements.

Dating of Glass Beads

Where beads were found within excavation sites provide information on the dating of the beads and on the social context or significance of the beads to those who owned and wore them. Chemical analysis of beads gives information on the glass used to make the bead, but not the bead itself. Instead, radiocarbon dating of the materials in the context or location in which the bead was found indicates the age of the bead. In these excavation sites radiocarbon dating was done on samples of contexts such as charcoal, burnt material, oak timbers, organic material in the layer, E ware, bedding material, and floor layers. The Irish beads are dated from the 5th century to the 12th century, depending on the bead’s Class. The imported beads are dated primarily from the 5th century to the 9th century. Though some of the imported beads were dated over different periods such as the Melon bead, other bead types were dated to a more specific period.

In addition to glass beads being worn, there is evidence of glass working (i.e. making beads) that has been found at many sites across Ireland such as Deer Park Farms, Lagore Crannóg, Garranes Ringfort, Ballydoo, Movilla Abbey, Scotch Street, Cathedral Hill, and Dunmisk. It is likely that the glass bead makers at these workshops would have traded or sold the beads they made. Some excavation sites had glass bead making workshops as well as glass beads that were found in contexts where they would be have been worn and used, indicating that those who owned and wore the beads were not those who made the beads. Comparing the dates these sites were known to be active with dating of the glass working artifacts and the context dating of the glass beads provides a clearer connection between the glass bead makers and those who owned and wore the beads. The dating comparisons indicate that the glass beads were made, then traded or sold, and then worn within the same time period.

Social Significance and Meaning of Glass Beads

Beads from grave sites are thought to be what people wore more for special occasions, and the beads found in royal and settlement sites such as Lagore Crannóg and Deer Park Farms, respectively, are thought to show more about everyday life and dress. Most of the beads found in Ireland were found at royal and settlement sites instead of graves sites as the Christian Irish primarily utilized unaccompanied burials. Groups of beads have been found at settlement sites and at a few graves site the latter which supports the thought that these beads would have been strung and worn as necklaces. The various groupings also indicate that the number and type of beads strung was varied. Strings of beads can provide researchers with important information regarding the wearer of beads as well as the beads themselves. Analysis of the combinations of beads strung may show the ratio of insular to imported beads and may show whether beads from different periods were strung together; were earlier period beads still used along with “newer” beads? The strings of beads may also give information on the region the beads were used along with the age, gender and social status of the wearer. 

Glass beads were used as decoration on bronze and iron pins and brooches, and were both used functionally to fasten a garment like a brat or cloak and as objects of status. Beads and pins with beads were found in Royal sites often near known high-status jewelry which indicated they were valued and worn by people of high status such as a bronze pin with an annular blue bead found at Lagore Crannóg. These same ringed pins were those later adopted by the Vikings.

My reproductions of Irish and Imported Beads

I have reproduced some of the Imported beads found in Ireland: Guido Schedule 6viii beads: Melon beads, Guido Schedule 2v (a) beads, and Koch Type 49/50: Alternating stripes in spiral formation, as well as, the Class 10 Herringbone bead known in other typographies as a Reticella bead. I have also reproduced a ring pin with an annular blue bead which was based on a bronze ring pin found at the royal site Lagore Crannóg. I used modern wire for this first attempt. I intend to learn how to reproduce the ring pin using the more period technique to create the wrought metal. Versions of the class 10 bead and ring pin were exported and found outside of Ireland.

Modern vs Period Bead Making

The commercially made glass rods that I used to make my reproductions are made with the same components as those used by bead makers in early medieval Ireland and other countries: silica, soda (a flux to lower the melting point of the silica) and lime (calcium as a stabilizer to harden the glass and to keep the ingredients in their cohesive form). Silica comes from sand or flint (i.e. ground siliceous rocks). The more silica, the softer the glass. Soda (flux) was made from the ash of burned aquatic plants or potash which is from the ash of woodland plants. The addition of metals create different colors (e.g., cobalt- blues, iron- green). Glass makers use heat to form glass from its raw ingredients into glass which is then re-heated, shaped and manipulated into pre-shaped glass rods. Glass makers then sold or traded these glass rods to glass bead makers.

Evidence was found in Ireland, as in other countries, that the workshops of glass makers and those of the glass bead makers were typically in different locations. Henderson and Ivens (cited in Mannion, 2015, p. 12-13) indicated possible evidence of glass manufacturing in Dunmisk, County Armagh.  Glass is now produced chemically and therefore is more easily accessible. Modern glass manufacturers are also able to create a greater diversity of colors of glass and glass with special reflective, reactive, and color shifting properties.

There were different methods of working the glass in period. Glass was melted in a crucible and a metal rod was placed in the molten glass to pick it up and then wind it onto the mandrel (i.e., hot trailing). A rod of glass that was heated and then wound onto the mandrel was also used. This method of winding heated glass onto the mandrel is what I used. I used commercially produced stainless steel mandrels that are not unlike the iron rod mandrels used in period. I created stringers and twisted stringers that I then used to decorate my Koch 49/50 beads and the Class 10 Herringbone Beads. Stringers can also be used for other decorations such as drawing waves, zigzags, lines, spirals and dots on beads. Bead makes in period decorated their beads in the same manner.  Modern heat sources are torches with fuels, such as the Hot Head Torch and Mapp Gas that I use to recreate the beads. Period heat sources were stone or clay structures fired with wood or charcoal with the bellows to add extra oxygen to increase the temperature of the flame.

Experimental Bead Furnace

Mistress Elysabeth (Lissa) Underhill, Mistress Brunissende (Bruni) Dragonette, and I have created experimental versions of more period furnaces as a heat source for making beads. I have successfully made beads on our latest versions of the furnace.

References

Cummings, Keith, A History of Glassforming, University of Pennsylvania Press,     Chapters 1-4, 2002.

Dubin, Lois Sherr, The History of Beads: from 30,000 B.C. to the Present, Harry N.  Abrams, Inc., New York, 1987.

Hencken, H. (1950, November). Lagore Crannog: An Irish Royal Residence of the 7th to 10^th Centuries A.D. Proceeding of the Royal Irish Academy, 1-151.

Lynn, C., & McDowell, J. A. (2011). Deer Park Farms: The excavation of a raised rath in  the Glenarm Valley, Co. Antrim. Norwich: Stationery Office. Chapters 1, 18, 34 and 35

Mannion, Margaret. (2013). An Examination of Glass Beads from Early Medieval Ireland. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from ARAN-Access to Research at NUI Galway. URI: http://aran.library.nuigalway.ie/xmlui/handle/10379/3724

Mannion, M. (2015). Glass beads from early medieval Ireland: Classification, dating, social          performance. Oxford: Archaeopress

Tettinger, Corina, Passing the Flame (A Beadmakers Guide to Detail and Design),   BonzoBucks & Books Publishing, 2002.

Wallace, P. 2008. Irish Archaeology and the Recognition of Ethnic Difference in Viking Dublin. In J. Habu, and C. Fawcett, and J. M. Matsunaga (eds), Evaluating Multiple Narratives: Beyond Nationalist, Colonialist and Imperialist Archaeologies. New York.