Medieval Censer — Close Focus

My customary trawl through PAS records of similar finds to those I'm currently researching, turned up a surprisingly small quantity of actual censers or fragments thereof. There are a handful of fragments of them recorded and just the one complete hemisphere. 

Mostly, those items I viewed in these searches were items dubbed 'lamp hangers' and as backup, possibly 'censer hangers'. All possessed three suspension points for chains.

Censers of the middle Ages usually have four attachment points for chains but rarely three.  However, as mentioned, there is an example of a complete lid from Shropshire, England and this does indeed possess a complement of just three suspension lugs, and the British Museum keeps a complete Scandinavian example with the same arrangement, and so I suppose that 'censer hanger' may be correct in some cases.

It was a pretty fruitless search until I discovered the one intriguing item — certainly part of a censer — that did indeed seem to share some features with my own ~

Even extreme magnification does not help much here... 

This rim fragment from Mundham, Norfolk, has what looks to be a very similar style of incised decoration. Alas, there is not much information here to work with. Regretfully, it is in a parlous state, and I cannot work out much from what I can see of it. There is a band of running sinuous decoration at bottom for sure and what look to be the starting points of two semi-circular lines that may have formed complete semi-circular fields. 

Between these and above the suspension lug are four vertical lines that may have formed plant fronds or similar. To the right is geometrical decoration that is just too incomplete and unclear to comment on. The broken edges are so corroded and abraded that any traces of perforations are quite impossible to spot.

It's a shame that it is so badly preserved, but still, it is the closest English parallel I have yet found and it hails from a place not remotely distant from Mid-Essex...

This piece also shows me exactly what one of the suspension lugs of an 'English' censer would have looked like. This is of some use because my fragment does not possess one. It shows that it was cast integrally and not soldered or riveted on afterwards, as with many continental examples. 

As I am making a reconstruction of what may actually be an English production (its vigorous and unusual 'regional' decorative style is very suggestive of this possibility) rather than a French, German, or even Scandinavian import — I will certainly incorporate this detail.

Condition and its importance ~

I'd rather work a slow field that yields occasional finds in copper alloys but in excellent condition, than a fast and furious one where everything copper-based is shot through with corrosion. On such fields as those, you are going to have to be content with precious metal items, if there are enough there to make the exercise worthwhile.

Luckily, this piece (from a dead slow field) arrived in my hand in such great condition that really close investigation reveals all kinds of tiny but crucial clues about its making... 

A worthwhile exercise indeed!

The incised decoration is so very sharp and clear. So much so, that I can see that the tool required to create it was a certain shape at the tip and was polished. I can be almost certain that the process employed was 'lost wax' because the incisions shine in a way that just would not occur by working into damp clay. The surface shows fine horizontal striations, which say that at one point in the process of the making of the object, it was either turned on a lathe or was gently coaxed into shape (likely, before decoration commenced) by turning in the hand.  

 

The reverse is also a real treat. It is simply packed full of information about manufacturing methods ~

1. You can see that wax was laid or painted to a thickness of around 2mm, onto a fairly roughly finished core — probably of traditional loam, (pronounced. 'loom') which is clay and sand mixed with horse dung and/or straw. There are both incuse and relief traces of plant fibre (now in metal, of course) preserved in the casting. 

2. The windows were cast 'blind' so that a thin film of metal remained that was later punched through and the rough edges were folded backwards into the interior. 

3. There's many tiny incuse triangular tool marks which all align upwards. This really foxed me for a long time. They could not feasibly have been cast in unless the maker had applied tiny triangles of clay to the core and if they all face one direction then there is clear reason for this.

Eventually I tumbled that these have to be the sign of breaking out and removing the final remains of the fire-hardened core with an iron tool because these marks had been punched directly into cold metal. And the reason for the single direction is also clear. The maker probably held the cast in his lap and worked the tool around the interior to clear what remained stuck fast,  hammering away as he went. 

Until I had studied and gained a little useful knowledge of the lost-wax method,  I just could not see this!