Quoit brooch

[3] In the Quoit Brooch Style the very varied motifs are largely geometrical but include human face-masks and processions or confronted pairs of schematic animals.

[6] In late Roman Gaul and Britain cingula or belts decorated with metal fittings were worn as signs of rank by both soldiers and civilian officials.

[9] The discovery of an increasing number of important products of the Quoit Brooch ″school″ in northern France, however, shows that neither the style, nor the forms of jewellery are purely insular developments[10] and that they cannot be linked with any particular ethnic group.

An alternative theory has therefore been advanced that they are associated with broadly Germanic, mercenary or federate forces employed in the defence of both southern Britain and northern Gaul in the 5th century, who identified themselves and their status by the creation of innovative metalwork in late Roman tradition.

[15] The brooches, the belt-fittings and the style, are mainly found in high-status burials in southern-eastern England, south of the Thames, and right across northern France, dating from the middle quarters of the 5th century.