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Bronze hook from a mail shirt in the form of a horned serpent. (Mid-1st century A.D.)

The hook takes the form of a simply modelled, highly Celtic rendering of a ram’s-headed serpent. The body, tapering towards the head, describes two curves, the upper a tight reversal of the lower, to form the hook, and the neck partly reverses the curve again so that the head points outwards. The body of the serpent is hardly decorated, with only a light ridge down the centre which sweeps inwards above the hinge emphasizing the one-sided nature of the fitting. The head is modelled in very high relief. Two large lentold eyes dominate the face and converge inwards at the top of the head, their line being continued in the tightly curled ram’s horns which lie immediately above them. The curve of the horns extends beyond the curved line of the cheeks, but below the eyes the face tapers sharply to a narrow muzzle but then widen out slightly to a bulbous snout.