Sceattas in Anglo-Saxon Graves

Scull C, Naylor J

© 2016, © Society for Medieval Archaeology 2016. ANGLO-SAXON SILVER PENNIES (sceattas) are rare as gravegoods, but their provision was a regular element of burial practice in a small minority of later 7th-century-furnished inhumations and later burials. Although the number both of coins and burials is very small, they show patterns of deposition and treatment that have both a cultural and a broader chronological significance. This sample provides a window on social and symbolic attitudes to the coinages as elements of the broader material culture of contemporary society, and constitutes important corroborating evidence that the Primary Phase issues embodied a new degree of monetisation in 7th-century England.