Rings from Vittene

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One of the Vitteneringe

The rings by Vittene are five gold rings that were found in Vittene not far from Norra Björke Kyrka in Västergötland in Sweden . The special thing about the Vittene ring find is that it was scattered over the settlement and did not belong to a closed find .

The more or less damaged rings with a total weight of about 2000 grams are of different types. Their origin extends chronologically over a period of about 400 years. The oldest is the first ring found, dating back to the 2nd or 1st century BC. Can date to BC. The youngest ring probably belongs to the 2nd century AD. In addition to these real gold rings, there are some similar reproductions known, for example on the silver kettle from Gundestrup in Denmark.

The first ring was found while working in the garden, but the find initially remained unknown. A few years later, when a report about the theft of the ring by Havor was broadcast on television, did the finders contact the local museum in 1955. The ring was recognized as the counterpart of the Havor ring, which was unique in Sweden until then . Six rings of this type are known to date. Three come from the Ukraine (one from Olbia , two from Smjela, near Kiev ) and one from Denmark (Dronninglund).

The ring differs from the Havor ring in terms of both quality and structure, but both have the same basic shape. The conical transitions between the end buttons and the ring body have filigree decorations on the ring by Vittene and alternate between flat parts and those with decoration. The ring itself consists of twisted wires that have been laid as a spiral around a core of smooth gold strands. This manufacturing technique stiffened the ring so that it was probably difficult to open and close. One can speculate whether the craftsman originally intended to remove the gold strands after the spiral was completed. If he had, the ring would look even more like Havor's.

The discovery of the first ring gave rise to a scientific project that unearthed four more gold rings and in the course of which parts of a large settlement from the pre-Roman and Roman Iron Ages (around 500 BC to 450 AD) were excavated. Two rings are of a kind that has not been found in Scandinavia before. They are so big that they look more like rings attached to statues of supernatural size. The shape, which is similar to the torc , seems to have carried figures of gods, as the statue of Glauberg shows. Similarly, the silver ring from Trichtingen is too big for a person. It is characteristic that these rings end in large triangular plates and the section in between consists of a twisted gold rod, as with the torque. The only parallel exists to the "Ring of Hellested" found in Denmark, which is dated to the Migration Period.

The fourth ring has animal heads on the ends. He belongs to a heterogeneous group of rings with more or less stylized animal heads as they are known from many parts of Europe. Its special species is only known from three other specimens, all of which come from southern Scandinavia and are dated to the second half of the early Roman Iron Age. The fifth and youngest ring is a ready-made object. Its end tends to be wider so that it appears as if it should be made into a ring similar to numbers two and three.

literature

  • Jan-Peter Lamm: The Vittene hoard a gold-treasure from Västergötland in Sweden with continental background . In: Peregrinatio Gothica, Supplementum ad Acta Musei Moraviae Scientiae sociales LXXXII, 1997.
  • Joachim Werner: The golden arm ring of the Frankish king Childerich and the Germanic wrist rings of the younger imperial era . Early Medieval Research by the University of Münster, 14. Berlin 1980
  • Erik Nylén & Birgit Arrhenius: Havor Hoard: The Gold, the Bronzes, the Fort . (= Kungliga Vitterhets, Historie och Antikvitets Akademiens Handlingar. Antikvariska series. 46). Kungliga Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Academies, Stockholm 2005 ISBN 91-7402-345-4

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1] Fig

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