Casgliadau Arlein

Small iron spearhead with a leaf-shaped blade with diamond shaped cross section due to a faint mid rib running along its length. The seamless conical socket does not extend into the blade and the remains of opposing circular perforations are visible beneath the wings of the blade near the base of the socket. Two small copper alloy rivets have been inserted through additional holes perpendicular to the original perforations and may have been a repair. It is generally recognised that there is no clear distinction between Iron Age socketed spearheads and those of Roman date. The examples from Iron Age contexts in East Yorkshire (Stead 1991) and Fiskerton (Parker-Pearson and Field) have blades with a flat or lenticular cross section, a characteristic in the minority within the first century AD Hod Hill Group I to which this example may belong (Manning 1985). However, the use of rivets is uncommon in this group and many of the sockets have visible seams or non-joining flanges. Bronze rivets were used at Fiskerton and during the first century AD occupation at Bredon Hill (Hencken 1939), but there are no examples of such a repair.