Battersea Cauldron

It was bought by the British Museum from William Godwin shortly after it was discovered.

It was made from seven curved plates of bronze riveted together, forming a cooking vessel with a large round body and narrower neck.

The opening flares out, strengthened with corrugations around the rim, which has a separate tubular binding.

As a large vessel for preparing food or drink, it may have been used for communal feasts, and has the patches and repairs from use over an extended period, perhaps several generations.

Large bronze cauldrons are also found in elite burials of the Iron Age Hallstatt culture in Germany and France.