A Hoard of Metalwork of the Early Iron Age from Ringstead, Norfolk

Abstract

The widespread adoption of deeper ploughing has led to the discovery during recent years of many remarkable antiquities in East Anglia. Prominent among recent discoveries resulting from this practice have been a series of finds of metal objects of the Early Iron Age in north-western Norfolk. These have ranged from an iron anthropoid sword with an inhumation burial at Shouldham through isolated finds, such as tores at Bawsey and North Creake, to the impressive group of hoards of ornaments and coins at Snettisham and the small hoard here studied found at Ringstead five miles from Snettisham and two miles east of Hunstanton.Few remains of the latter part of the Iron Age from about 100 B.C. to A.D. 43 had previously been recorded from north-west Norfolk. Within a ten-mile radius of Ringstead only indefinite traces of human occupation had been noted, such as pottery from Hunstanton and coins of the Iceni from Brancaster, Burnham Thorpe and possibly Ingoldisthorpe. A much-damaged hillfort at South Creake has been attributed to this period, though on very little direct evidence. Actual indications of settlement at this period are still very scanty.