Hair ornaments of copper and gold

These six gilt copper and gold penannular rings were probably hair ornaments. They are part of a hoard of jewellery and other items buried in a pot sometime between 950 and 750 BC, and ploughed up at Balmashanner in Angus. They were made in Ireland.

The three rings with a circular cross section were made of a thin plate of gold covering a copper core. The three on the bottom are made of a thin plate of beaten gold. The one on the bottom right has been decorated with incised lines in panels.

The Balmashanner hoard demonstrates how extensive and complex were the contacts between Scotland and the outside world during the early first millennium BC. The contents came from Ireland, northern Europe, north-west Europe and the eastern Alps.

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