Iron Age reaping hook - iron blade with bone handle
This well-preserved Middle Iron Age reaping hook found in Brackley, looks like an everyday farming implement, but it is a symbol of prehistoric farming. Most modern people would recognise it; such utilitarian tools change very little over thousands of years but despite its mundane first impression, this agricultural tool helps us visualise the lives of the Iron Age community.
The reaping hook comprises a curved, tanged iron blade hafted onto a bone handle. The handle shows signs of excessive wear showing that it was well-used before burial. It was so well-preserved because it was deliberately placed in clay, possibly as a ritual offering during the construction of a granary, perhaps to ensure plentiful future harvests. It is likely that this object held far greater significance to its original owners than its first impression suggests.
Brackley
Contributed by Charlotte Walker, Historic Environment Record
This astonishingly well preserved example of a chatelaine (collection of personal grooming objects), is a high-status object made to be seen as much as used.
© NMAG
©
NMAG
©
NMAG
©
NMAG
©
NMAG