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Lot 471

A Very Rare Migration Period Iron Helmet
5th/6th Century

Amended
1 December 2009, 14:00 GMT
London, Knightsbridge

Sold for £5,760 inc. premium

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A Very Rare Migration Period Iron Helmet
5th/6th Century

The domed skull formed of five iron plates riveted together, comprising two-piece skull joined together over the top by a broad waisted band embossed with a low medial ridge, and around the brim by two broad plates flared out, each pierced with pairs of small holes for a lining at the top, and at the turned lower edge (pitted and with some lamination) (2)
21.5 cm. high

Footnotes

Provenance:
By repute discovered in a deep crevice by a path beneath Aggstein Castle, Lower Austria and offered with a handwritten postcard of the castle dated 1926 and giving details to this effect

Saleroom notices

For two similar helmets excavated with other items including two spangenhelms at Vid, near Metkovic, central Dalmatia, in 1903 see Bruno Thomas and Ortwin Gamber, Katalog Der Leitrϋstkammer, I. Tell ..., Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien, 1976, pp. 34-36, cat. No. 2 (illustrated). The items in Vienna have been attributed to the Alans, a group of Sarmatians, nomadic pastoralists of the 1st millennium A.D. See Bernard S. Bachrach, A history of the Alans in the West: from their first appearance in the sources of classical antiquity through the early Middle Ages, 1973

Additional information

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