Roman fingerrings

This reports present the metal finds from the Roman villa at Northfleet recovered in the course of the HS1 excavation in the Ebbsfleet valley. Apart from brooches, the finds include, amongst others, an armilla, a rare type of seal-box with a depiction of a beneficarius lance head, and a smith's swage.

The article is devoted to the analysis of one group of golden finger rings with lamellar facetted hoops, which are decorated with convex inlays of garnet, turquoise and, rarely, glass, set in the lamellar cells, framed with beaded wire. The finger rings of this group, which originate from the territory of the Bosporan Kingdom, vary from the finds from the western provinces of the Roman Empire, Western Pontic area and Asia Minor. On the hoops of some of the facetted finger rings there are punched inscriptions. Similar inscriptions, made after analogous formula, occur also on the golden finger rings with the hoops, convex from outside.
Given the peculiarities of the shape and decoration of the finger rings, the fact, that all the known finds of the finger rings of the group discussed originate or most probably originate from the territory of the Bosporan Kingdom, and the circumstance, that the inscriptions punched on their hoops are made after the same formula, there are all the grounds to consider this as a local phaenomenon. This suggestion is further confirmed by the analysis of the personal names of the inscriptions, the majority of which finds comparanda in the Bosporan lapidary inscriptions. The finger rings of the group discussed, given the analysis of their finds in the burial complexes, may be dated in the frames of the late 2nd – 3rd  centuries AD. There are all the grounds to suggest, that they were not only inscribed but also manufactured in the local Bosporan jewellery workshops.