Copyright C 2000

Acta Archaeologica vol. 71, 2000, pp. 6578

Printed in Denmark All rights reserved

ACTA ARCHAEOLOGICA
ISSN 0065-001X

THE MILLHILL BURIAL IN CONTEXT

Artifact, Culture, and Chronology in the Viking West
by
S H. H

INTRODUCTION
In 1896 a group of workmen made a remarkable archaeological discovery on the Isle of Arran, in southwest Scotland (Balfour 1910a, 221). They had been
hired to level the ground for a new house at Millhill,
sometimes (erroneously) called Mildhill, near Lamlash, on the east coast of this small mountainous island in the Firth of Clyde (Fig. 1). While so engaged,
they uncovered what they believed to be the parts of
an old sword some 34 feet (0.91.2 m) below the
surface of a small gravel mound which had previously
occupied the site a short distance south of Blairmore
burn and approximately 170 (51 m) from the high
water mark (Balfour 1910b, 167).
The full implications of this discovery were not
fully realised at the time, and the fragments remained
in private hands for some thirteen years before
eventually coming to the attention of J.A. Balfour, a
Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. It
was he who first identified the site at Millhill as a
Viking-Grave Mound and realised that the iron
fragments which had been recovered were actually
the remains of a sword and shield boss which had
rusted together. Balfour was also the first to realise
the chronological significance of these artifacts, using
comparative material from Norway to propose a date
of deposition in the eighth or early ninth century.
As a result, he suggested that these relics proclaim
(ed) this to be one of the earliest, if not the earliest,
of Viking-grave mounds yet discovered in Scotland
(1910a, 224). Despite this somewhat problematic con-

clusion, Balfours comments have gone largely unchallenged for nearly ninety years.
At the most basic level of course, few modern commentators would doubt that the Millhill find represents a poorly furnished male grave. Similar graves,
both richly and poorly furnished, are far from uncommon in the coastal regions of western and northern
Scotland, with particularly high concentrations in the
islands to the west of Arran and the Mull of Kintyre
(Grieg 1940, 2963), and further south on the Isle of
Man (Bjrn & Shetelig 1940, 226). Although a group
of weapons from Claghbane, on the latter island, has
recently been interpreted as a cenotaph rather than
a burial (Cubbon 1983, 18), it should be remembered
that very few nineteenth century excavators showed
particular interest in what were generally dismissed as
osseous remains (Wilde 1869, 14). In the case of the
Millhill burial in particular, the fifteen years which
separated the discovery and reporting of the grave
may have caused some confusion of unrecorded detail, and recent scientific analysis of the shield boss
strongly suggests that it originally accompanied a
burial of some kind (pers. comm. C. Paterson 1996).
Given the geographical position of Arran within
an area of known Scandinavian activity (i.e. Crawford
1987, 878, 934), it is perhaps equally unsurprising
that the association of the burial with Scandinavian
ritual activity has also gone virtually unquestioned,
despite the highly problematic nature of the artifacts
themselves (see below). One of the few dissenting
voices in this debate was Sigurd Grieg, who suggested

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Fig. 1. Map showing distribution of large conical bosses in the

British Isles. They can be divided into convex (Irish Sea A) and
concave (Irish Sea B) examples.

that the shield boss in particular resembled AngloSaxon or Merovingian bosses somewhat more than it
(did) Norse ones (1940, 27). Subsequently even he
shied away from this idea however, instead stating
that it was quite possible that the artifact was Norse,
and perhaps even earlier than Balfour had thought.
He eventually concluded that the find (could) hardly
date from a time later than the middle of the eighth
century, which from what we know, would seem surprisingly early (1940, 28). Although many might feel
Griegs final words are something of an understatement, an exceptionally early date has been accepted,
with varying degrees of conviction, by virtually every
commentator since. Haakon Shetelig, who had also
communicated with Balfour prior to the first publication of the burial (1910a, 224), came down firmly
in favour of a mid-eighth century deposition, suggesting that the Millhill burial might even represent

one of the earliest Viking graves in western Europe

(1954, 75). More recently Crawford (1987, 1201) has
used the boss and sword to suggest a Scandinavian
presence in Scotland prior to AD 800, while Myhre
(1993, 1901) has used the sword in particular as evidence to support a similar hypothesis of early activity
in Britain and Ireland as a whole.
In the same paper in which he argued for this early
activity, Myhre also commented on the remarkable
changes which have swept through archaeological
theory and practice in the last thirty years. As a result
of work by scholars such as Hodder (i.e. 1986), it is
no longer thought sufficient to draw direct parallels
between material culture (as represented by artifacts)
and the broader cultural milieu within which an individual normally acts. While much of this new research has focussed on the role of symbolism and ritual, it has also become clear that artifacts, and even
the technological and stylistic knowledge used to
create them, can and do cross perceived cultural divides at regular intervals (i.e. Renfrew & Bahn 1996,
3626). The last thirty years have also seen a nearexplosion in scientific dating methods which, in relating many previously undatable archaeological events
to an independent absolute calender, have simultaneously revealed many of the chronological and
theoretical flaws of traditional typological studies (i.e.
Renfrew 1975). While few of these new methods can
be directly applied to a burial which was destroyed
more than a century ago, a re-appraisal of the artifacts concerned is surely long overdue.

THE SWORD
As Balfour noted that the two artifacts were originally
mistaken for the parts of an old sword (above), it
seems likely that the Millhill sword was relatively wellpreserved when first recovered. Unfortunately, Grieg
noted that it had not been handed in to the National
Museum (1940, 28), and the swords whereabouts is
completely unknown today (pers. comm. C. Paterson
1996). As a result, all research carried out since 1910
has been entirely dependent on two (almost identical)
articles published by Balfour in that year (1910a,
2214 & 1910b, 16971). According to these sources,
the sword, which was single-edged and of the longer
variety, had been doubled over on itself prior to de-

The Millhill Burial in Context

position. Two blade fragments of 49 cm and 9.5 cm
respectively survived to a maximum width of 6 cm.
The lower part of the blade was amissing, but an
11.5 cm fragment of the upper part of the hilt survived. As a sax of this type usually had a grip sufficient for both hands, Balfour suggested that a substantial portion of this hilt was also missing. The
characteristic flat tang or spit of these weapons was
visible in places, but elsewhere the wooden portion of
the grip survived. The remains of two iron guards
could also be seen on the hilt, a feature which Balfour
regarded as very unusual. A portion of the wooden
pommel ... having on the top a circular hole, probably
made by a nail to attach some ornamental portion
was also present, presumably as a separate fragment
(1910a, 2234).
Balfours figures suggest a minimum length of 58.5
cm for the blade, and 70 cm for the sword as a whole,
although the original may have been substantially
longer. Most commentators, including Balfour
(1910a, 224), have dismissed the sword as useless for
dating, with both Grieg (1940, 27) and Shetelig (1945,
13) basing their early deposition date almost entirely
on the accompanying shield boss. Myhre (1993, 190),
on the other hand, has ignored the shield boss, instead using the sword to date the burial to a period
before AD 800. This early date is based on similarities
between the Millhill sword and a group of single-edged Merovingian examples from Hordaland and Sogn
og Fjordane in western Norway (Helgen 1982, 67). In
point of fact, almost all of the Merovingian swords
from this area lack the guards which were apparently
such a noticeable feature of the Millhill sword. Many
of the single-edged swords of Viking Age date from
the same area have hilts which seem to be rather
closer to the Millhill example however (ibid., 6768).
Generally believed to derive from their Merovingian
counterparts, such single-edged swords are actually
well represented in the Scandinavian archaeological
corpus, comprising 33.8% of the Viking Age swords
examined by Petersen in 1919 (1919, 5).
Rather closer to Arran, at least seven single-edged
swords have been recovered from the immediate environs of Dublin (Coffey & Armstrong 1910, 111; Be
1940, 65), a settlement directly accessible via the Firth
of Clyde and the North Channel. According to Be
(1940, 123), at least four of these swords had a (nar-

67

Fig. 2. Cross-section of the Millhill boss (Irish Sea A). Note the
exceptionally broad flange and the remains of the bolt feature on
its lower surface. Drawn by the author.

row) upper crossbar similar to the iron guards described by Balfour on the Arran example. Despite
Myhres protestations to the contrary (1993, 1901),
the vast majority of commentators would agree that
these swords must post-date AD 837 at the earliest,
and more probably post-date AD 841, when a permanent settlement (longphort) was established at the site
(Clarke 1990, 65). Given this information, it seems
safe to assume, even in the absence of the artifact
itself, that the Millhill sword does not provide clear
evidence of deposition in the eighth century, but is
instead far more likely to post-date AD 800. While
there is of course still a slight possibility that the sword
corresponds to an earlier (late eighth century) type,
evidence for such an early date clearly depends on its
associated shield boss.

THE SHIELD BOSS

With the notable exception of Myhre (above) almost
all commentators have agreed on the cultural associations and approximate (i.e. ninth century) date of the
Millhill sword. In the case of the shield boss however,
a dearth of direct comparative material has resulted
in a greater diversity of opinion as to its date and
origin. To most observers, the most immediately obvious feature of this boss, preserved in the National Museum of Scotland as IL726, is its exceptionally broad
flange (Fig. 2). The flange (sometimes called the rim),
that part of the boss which originally connected it to
the surrounding shield board, is normally less than
2.0 cm across, at least in insular areas (Harrison 1995,
161401). Although approximately two thirds of the

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Fig. 4. Cross-section of the Ormside boss (Irish Sea A). Note the
broad flange with the remains of a rivet and rivet hole. After
Cowen (1934), Fig. 1.
Fig. 3. The lower surface of the Millhill boss flange. Note the bolt
feature on the right. Photograph by the author. Scale 1 : 3.

Millhill boss flange is missing, the extant portions are

at least twice this width, at 4.6 cm. This gives the boss
a maximum external diameter of 21.4 cm, 4 cm wider
than the next largest example from an insular context
(the related Ormside boss, discussed below), and
nearly 7 cm wider than the majority of such bosses.
Another unique feature of the Millhill boss is what
Balfour called the bolt: a piece of rounded metal
running across the flange and firmly attached to its
lower surface (Fig. 3). This feature mystified Balfour
and Shetelig (1910a, 2213) but has been widely ignored since, with most debate focussing on the basic
profile of the boss.
In a period where Petersen was perhaps justified in
complaining of the paucity of forms in which shield
bosses occurred (1919, 19), and where general texts
from Foote and Wilson (1970, 278) to GrahamCampbell (c. 1980, 74) agree that Viking Age Scandinavian shield bosses were almost invariably hemispherical, the Millhill boss is paradoxically conical. In
addition this boss, 9 cm high and 12 cm in diameter,
rises directly from the flange in a single smooth convex curve, without any intervening collar or wall.
Such collars, positioned immediately above the
flange, are a feature of almost all known Scandinavian (Rygh 1885, 217221, 562564), Anglo-Saxon
(Dickinson & Hrke 1992, 1) and even Irish (Hencken
1950, 989) shield bosses of the Early Medieval
Period. Given this list of unusual and even unique
attributes, it is perhaps not surprising that the boss

has generated so much controversy since its initial

publication in 1910.

THE MILLHILL BOSS IN CONTEXT

THE IRISH SEA GROUP
Although the Millhill boss has a number of very unusual features, it is a mistake to see it as a single,
isolated anomaly within the Scandinavian world. In
Scandinavia itself, at least one archaeologist has questioned the absolute monopoly of the hemispherical
boss type in the Viking Age (i.e. Roesdahl 1982, 138),
and recent research has demonstrated that some 60%
of extant shield bosses from insular Scandinavian
graves (32 of 53 examples) are actually conical rather
than hemispherical (Harrison 1995, 534). The vast
majority of these examples are part of a group of
small conical bosses (henceforth the Dublin type)
which are not particularly closely related to the
Millhill boss and have a complex evolution which is
beyond the scope of the current paper (but see below).
The remaining six examples, however, of which the
Millhill boss is probably the best known, are rather
more closely linked in terms of size and morphology,
and merit further discussion in this context.
The single closest morphological parallel with the
Millhill burial is provided by a convex conical boss
from Ormside in Cumbria. This artifact, which was
initially mistaken for a cap, also lacks any form of
collar, has an external diameter of 17.2 cm, and is
8.9 cm high (Fig. 4). Like the Millhill example, much
of this diameter depends on an unusually broad, 3.2
cm wide, flange. The boss was recovered together
with a double-edged sword, a knife and an enigmatic

The Millhill Burial in Context

69

Fig. 5. The Cronk Moar boss (Irish Sea A). Note the narrow flange,
with surviving rivet heads. After Bersu & Wilson (1966), Fig. 45.

metal rod from a churchyard in the Eden valley, approximately 60 km south of the Solway Firth, in 1898
(Ferguson 1899, 37980). After consultation with
various experts, it was initially decided that these finds
represented a Danish inhumation, largely on the
basis of the sword (Read 1899, 1945). In 1934 however, Cowen (1723) suggested that the burial might
actually be late Merovingian or Anglo-Saxon,
largely on the basis of the shield boss. This idea was
later dismissed by Bjrn and Shetelig (1940, 19) who
instead linked the boss to some of the other conical
forms found in insular Scandinavian graves. Cowen
himself (1948, 75) subsequently revised his opinion
to conform to their interpretation, which has been
generally accepted ever since.
A third, closely related boss was recovered some
fifty years after these two examples during the excavation of a grave mound at Cronk Moar, Jurby, in
the northern part of the Isle of Man (Bersu & Wilson
1966, 63ff) (Fig. 5). Although this boss has a very
much narrower flange (only 1.6 cm broad), and
consequently has an external diameter of just 15.1
cm, it shares the characteristic convex, conical profile
of the other two, rising to a height of 8.1 cm. In the
past, the Cronk Moar boss has been associated with
other conical bosses from the Irish Sea area, particular those from Dublin (ibid., 78), but the more direct
morphological links with the Millhill and Ormside
examples have never been fully investigated. The key
features which connect all three bosses are the shape
and size of the boss proper, that part of the boss
which originally protected the hand at the point
where it gripped the shield (Simpson 1980, 1167). If
one ignores the variation in flange width, the profile,
height and diameter of all three bosses are remarkably consistent. Just 0.9 cm separates the lowest boss

Fig. 6. The Kiloran Bay boss (Irish Sea B). Although its apex is
missing, this is the tallest extant Viking Age boss from Britain or
Ireland. Note the distinctive concave curve of the boss and the
irregular flange. Drawn by the author.

(Cronk Moar, at 8.1 cm) from the highest (Millhill, at

9 cm), and just 0.5 cm separates the narrowest boss
(Ormside, at 11.4 cm) from the other two (Millhill
and Cronk Moar, both at 11.9 cm).
This is in sharp contrast to the hemispherical Scandinavian type bosses of the British Isles, the intact
examples of which range from 5.4 to 8.6 cm in height,
and from 9.9 to 12.8 cm in diameter, despite the fact
that they all conform to just one of the four Viking
Age shield boss types identified by Olaf Rygh in 1885,
specifically type R.562 (Harrison 1995, 59). Given the
remarkable similarities between these three convex
conical bosses (henceforth the Irish Sea A group),
and their limited geographical distribution in the
northern part of the Irish Sea area, it is even tempting
to suggest that they may have been the product of a
single workshop. Certainly the excessive flange width
of the Millhill and Ormside examples must be seen
as a decorative rather than a functional feature, given
that the much narrower flange of the Cronk Moar
example was apparently sufficient to secure a boss of
this size to a shield board.
It is interesting to note that unusual flanges are also
a feature of the remaining large conical bosses from
insular Scandinavian graves (henceforth the Irish Sea
B group). Like the Irish Sea A group, these three
bosses share very distinct boss profiles, but they have
concave rather than convex sides, resulting in a profile which has occasionally been called funnelshaped (Grieg 1940, 50). The characteristic morphology of these bosses is perhaps best illustrated by
the exceptionally tall example from a boat burial at

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Fig. 7. The Balladoole boss (Irish Sea B). Note the angled flange
extensions and rivets on each side. After Bersu & Wilson (1966),
Fig. 6.

Fig. 8. The College Green boss (Irish Sea B). A fragmentary boss,
badly encrusted in places. See also Fig. 9. Drawn by the author.

Kiloran Bay on Colonsay (Anderson 1907, 445) (Fig.

6). Parallels were first drawn between the Kiloran Bay
boss and a rather lower example from another boat
burial at Balladoole, Arbory, on the Isle of Man by
Bersu and Wilson (1966, 1417) (Fig. 7). These commentators also drew attention to a similar boss
(Wk.25) from Dublin, which they described as a
miniature of the other two (ibid., 17) (Fig. 8).
Although this boss, now more precisely provenanced to a small cemetery at College Green, Dublin, is very fragmentary today, a nineteenth century
water-colour shows it in much better condition, complete with an apex button and most of its rim (Harrison 1995, 11, 2547) (see Fig. 9). The evidence provided by this water-colour and the extant portion of
the boss suggests that it originally had a diameter of
at least 11.5 cm, rather broader than the Kiloran Bay
boss (10.4 cm), but narrower than the example from
Balladoole (12.8 cm). The fact that none of these
bosses has an intact apex makes it difficult to compare
their heights with any degree of accuracy, but today
the Balladoole boss is the lowest at 8.1 cm, the College Green boss is slightly higher at 8.5 cm, and the
Kiloran Bay boss is substantially taller at 12.2 cm.
Even allowing for the missing apices, this suggests that
there was substantial variation in size, particularly in
terms of height, between bosses of this Irish Sea B
group.
All of these bosses share the distinctive concave
profile however and (as stated above) they all have
unusual flanges, not in terms of width, as is the case
with the Irish Sea A group, but rather in terms of
angle. The overwhelming majority of shield bosses in
this period were secured to the shield board using a

number of rivets through the flange, which rested on

the outer surface of the shield board. In some cases,
slight curves in the angle of the flange have been used
to suggest that the associated shield board may have
been curved rather than flat (Brown 1980, 11), but
both the Kiloran Bay and Cronk Moar bosses have
flanges at such sharp angles that they must originally
have pierced their associated shield boards rather
than resting on their surfaces (Bersu & Wilson 1966,
1617). The evidence from the watercolour of the
College Green boss is rather more ambiguous, but no
trace of a conventional flat flange can be seen at any
point on its edge.

THE IRISH SEA GROUP IN CONTEXT

ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT
From this brief discussion it should be clear that although the Millhill boss has a number of unusual features, it forms part of a small group of large conical
bosses recovered from Scandinavian graves in the Irish Sea area. These bosses can be sub-divided into
convex and concave groups (Irish Sea A and B respectively), with the convex Millhill boss being a
prime example of the former. In its own way however, the Irish Sea group as a whole is as much an
anomaly within the broader Scandinavian context as
the Millhill boss itself. Consequently some effort must
be made to explain the origins and development of
these large conical bosses.
Some scholars, led by Bjrn and Shetelig (1940,
10) and Bersu and Wilson (1966, 1618) have sought
to explain the origins of the Irish Sea bosses by linking
them to the small conical bosses which completely

The Millhill Burial in Context

dominate the Dublin assemblage (Be 1940, 345).
Unfortunately, the origins of this Dublin type are in
themselves highly problematic (Wakeman 1891, 314
5; Coffey & Armstrong 1910, 1157; Be 1940, 34
5), and are beyond the scope of this current paper.
Essentially, these larger (Irish Sea A & B) and smaller
(Dublin) types are almost certainly related, but any
attempt to explain the development of one through
the presence of another leads almost inevitably to a
circular argument. Grieg (1940, 28) and Cowen
(1934, 1723), on the other hand, went so far as to
suggest that the bosses (and perhaps even the graves)
from Arran and Ormside respectively might actually
be Anglo-Saxon, or Merovingian, rather than Scandinavian. Ultimately however, both abandoned these
controversial interpretations in favour of the general
consensus of Scandinavian origin (discussed above).
Once it had been generally accepted that the
graves were Scandinavian, most commentators assumed that their grave goods, including any shield
bosses, had to be Scandinavian in inspiration. Unfortunately this apparently logical deduction generated
almost as many problems as it solved. At the core of
these difficulties is the fact that the vast majority of
Viking Age Scandinavian bosses were hemispherical,
not conical. The one exception to this general rule,
Olaf Ryghs type (R.)565, was characteristic of eastern
rather than western Scandinavia, and more significantly, seems to date from the period after AD 950
(Petersen 1919, 47). Because all Scandinavian style
burials in the British Isles seems to be earlier than this
(Wilson 1976, 99), it is clear that the various insular
conical bosses cannot be derived from type R.565. It
was almost certainly the absence of suitable Viking
Age prototypes which caused those seeking a Scandinavian origin for the Irish Sea group to turn their
attention to the preceding period, the so-called Older
Iron Age (ldre jernalder).
According to Ryghs 1885 study of Norske Oldsaker
(215221), the bosses of this earlier period were almost
exclusively conical, with only one hemispherical example among more than a hundred specimens. Unfortunately however, none of the four conical types illustrated by Rygh provide particularly close parallels with
either of the Irish Sea types. Perhaps the most plausible
prototype is Ryghs type 218, a relatively common
conical form, but the illustrated example has a definite

71

Fig. 9. Water-colour of the College Green boss. This nineteenth

century water-colour by James Plunkett shows the College Green
boss when it was considerably more intact. Note in particular the
apex button. From a picture entitled Table 45 (NMI).

constricted collar and is straight-sided rather than convex or concave. In addition, Rygh noted that type
R.218 was confined to the earlier part of the period,
meaning that any associated boss would have to date
from a period well before the generally accepted beginning of Viking activity in the British Isles. Despite the
vagueness of the morphological links between these
Norwegian bosses and the Irish Sea group, this seems
to be precisely the association which was made by
earlier commentators. Consequently the Millhill burial
has been consistently dated to the eighth century since
its initial publication.
Although none of Ryghs Older Iron Age types
seem to be closely related to the Irish Sea group, there
are a small number of bosses from Norwegian contexts which do provide slightly more convincing parallels, particularly in the case of the convex (Irish Sea
A) type. These bosses were first described by Evison
in 1963 (1963, 57), when she identified four Zuckerhut
or sugar-loaf bosses from southern Norway. These
bosses, which can be broadly dated to the first half
of the eighth century using associated artifacts, are
generally confined to the area around Oslo Fjord, and
were seen by Evison either as direct imports or a
local northern or Scandinavian copy of a northern
continental form (1963, 51, 57). As such, these bosses
are unlikely to have inspired the Irish Sea type directly. But Evisons article also demonstrated that the
large conical Zuckerhut boss was common throughout
Germanic Europe during the Migration Period, being
found in areas as diverse as Norway, Bavaria, and
Anglo-Saxon England. In point of fact, Anglo-Saxon
England has a far larger collection of Zuckerhut forms

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Fig. 10. Map showing the distribution of Sugar-Loaf shield bosses

in England. Note the convex variant is the dominant form in the
north and west. After Evison (1963), Fig. 5.

than Norway, with Evison recording no less than 28

examples of tall conical bosses, all of which seem to
occur in the latest pagan graves (ibid., 527) (Fig. 10).
In the context of the current debate, it is interesting
to note that the bosses of northern England (those
closest to the area where the Irish Sea A type is found)
tend to be convex, unlike those in the southern part
of the country which tend to be straight-sided. In addition, a number of the latest surviving Anglo-Saxon
examples lost the collar which was a distinctive feature of the group as a whole, instead rising in a single
convex curve directly from the flange to form a profile
which is remarkably similar to that of the Irish Sea A
type (Fig. 11). Given this strong morphological similarity, it does not seem altogether unreasonable to
postulate a connection between this late Anglo-Saxon
type and the Irish Sea A group in particular.
The key difficulty in making this association is of
course the chronological interval between the latest
deposition of shield bosses in Anglo-Saxon graves,
dated by Dickinson and Hrke (1992, 63) to the

middle of the seventh century, and the earliest deposition of an Irish Sea A boss in a Scandinavian grave.
Given that the abandonment of a direct Older Iron
Age Norwegian prototype effectively removes any
reason for dating the latter bosses to a period before
AD 800 (see below), one is left with a gulf of at least
a hundred and fifty years between the latest AngloSaxon examples and the earliest Irish Sea A boss. Evison herself believed that the Zuckerhut survived into
the eighth century (1963, 65), and Wilson (1981, 122
3) has used manuscript illustrations to show a continuing tradition of large conical bosses in the centuries
after the abandonment of pagan burial practices.
Even the eleventh century Bayeux Tapestry shows a
small number of round, conical bossed shields, and
while the interpretation of weaponry shown on the
Tapestry can be problematic, it is surely significant
that shields of this type are almost always shown in
the hands of leading Anglo-Saxon nobles (Wilson
1985, 164172).
Much of this evidence is of course circumstantial,
the total absence of post-seventh century AngloSaxon shield bosses from the archaeological record, it
is possible, and indeed probable, that the English
conical boss tradition continued into the ninth century. In Norway, on the other hand, the material recovered from ninth century graves provides certain
evidence that the conical boss tradition had died out
before the beginning of the Viking Age. Given the
lack of suitable prototypes in contemporary Norway,
or indeed elsewhere, it appears almost certain that
the large conical bosses used by the insular Norse
population were inspired by a contemporary AngloSaxon prototype rather than a relict Norwegian type.
The connections between the latest Anglo-Saxon
bosses and the Irish Sea type are most obvious in the
case of group A. Parallels for the concave group B
are more difficult to find, given that convex and
straight-sided bosses appear to heavily outnumber
concave forms in all the Germanic conical boss traditions (Evison 1963). Dickinson and Hrke (1992,
1013, 1720) did however note a limited number of
concave bosses in their study of Early Anglo-Saxon
Shields, with examples being concentrated in Groups
1, 4 and 5. While all of these boss types seem to have
died out by the end of the sixth century, the concave
form may represent a potential variation within the

The Millhill Burial in Context

73

Fig. 11a. Tall Curved Cone. An Anglo-Saxon Zuckerhut form recovered from Baginton, Warwickshire. Note the absence of a collar
and the pronounced apex button. After Evison (1963), Fig. 24a.

Fig. 11b. Tall Curved Cone. An Anglo-Saxon Zuckerhut form recovered from Thetford, Norfolk. Note the absence of a collar and
the pronounced apex spike. After Evison (1963), Fig. 24c.

Anglo-Saxon shield boss tradition which continued or

even reoccurred in subsequent centuries.
A further piece of evidence linking Irish Sea B bosses to Anglo-Saxon rather than Norwegian traditions
is the presence of an apex button in the nineteenth
century water-colour of the College Green boss (Fig.
9). These features are virtually unknown in Viking
Age Scandinavia, but are relatively common in Anglo-Saxon England, where Dickinson and Hrke call
them disc-heads (1992, 4, 24). Almost all of the intact tall conical forms illustrated by Evison have
apex buttons, for example (1963, 73ff). While there is
no direct evidence that the other two group B bosses
had apex buttons originally, the fact that two AngloSaxon coins were recovered from the Kiloran Bay
burial is an indication of some degree of Anglo-Saxon
influence in the area (Anderson 1907, 447).
One final piece of evidence connects both Irish Sea
types to an Anglo-Saxon rather than a Scandinavian
tradition of boss manufacture. This is directly related
to the enigmatic bolt attached to the lower surface
of the Millhill boss flange. Balfour rather tentatively
suggested that it might have served to fasten the boss
to the shield board, before concluding that the nature
and purpose of this object (was) an unsolved archaeological problem (1910a, 2213). Subsequent researchers have ignored this feature completely, but
close examination shows it to be a broken half-cylinder of yellowish metal, 1.4 cm wide, which extends
across the flange from the inner to the outer edge,
being most intact close to the inner edge (Fig. 3).

Where the bolt has been broken, its core seems to

be organic rather than metallic. A thin layer of what
appears to be wood, some 0.5 cm thick, has also been
preserved between the flat side of the feature itself
and the lower surface of the flange (Fig. 12). This is
almost certainly the remains of the shield board, and
is an indication that the bolt was originally located
on the inner surface of the shield.
When this information is combined with the fact
that the feature is angled so that a direct line extended
from it crosses the boss cavity slightly to one side of
the centre, it seems very likely that this bolt actually
represents the remains of a composite shield grip,
with a thin layer of metal alloy placed around an organic (wooden) core. The positioning of such a grip
slightly off-centre is common to most large-bossed
shield traditions throughout the Middle Ages. It was
an entirely practical feature, being based on the
simple fact that the back of the hand took up more
room within the boss cavity than the fingers when the
grip was in use (Bruce-Mitford 1978, 25). While grips
positioned in this way were as common in Scandinavia as Anglo-Saxon England, the fact that the grip is
composite would make it highly unusual within a Viking Age Scandinavian context. All of the exceptionally well preserved Gokstad shields, for example, were
equipped with wooden rather than composite grips
(Nicolaysen 1882, 62). The fact that no Scandinavian
(i.e. Rygh type 562) type shield boss in the British Isles
has been found in association with a composite grip
would also strongly suggest that their grips were nor-

74

Acta Archaeologica

Fig. 12. Cross-section of the Millhill composite grip (bolt). The

flange and inner surface of the boss are at the bottom of the picture.
The grip itself is c. 1.4 cm wide, at the point closest to the flange.
Note its metallic outer surface and apparent organic core, as well
as the remains of the shield board between the grip and the surface
of the flange. Photograph by the author.

mally wooden. In Anglo-Saxon England, on the other

hand, such composite grips are relatively common, at
least until the point where pagan burial practices were
abandoned (Dickinson & Hrke 1992, 247).
Similar composite grips of Viking Age date have
Floinn 1986,
also been discovered in Irish contexts (O
1068), and at least one grip of this type has been
found in direct association with a small Dublin type
boss from Ballinaby, on Islay (Anderson 1880, 612;
Harrison 1995, 3445). Given the absence of suitable
prototypes for this grip type in Ireland (and indeed
Scotland), it seems likely that these artifacts were first
introduced from Anglo-Saxon England, probably by
the local insular Scandinavian population. While the
Millhill grip is rather wider than these more intact
contemporary examples, the greater size and weight
of its associated boss may have required a more substantial grip. Another composite grip of indeterminate
width and length was found in association with the
Irish Sea B boss from Balladoole on the Isle of Man
(Bersu & Wilson 1966, 1416), once again providing
strong evidence for an Anglo-Saxon connection.
Given the large volume of evidence available, it seems
almost certain that the Irish Sea type as a whole owes
it origins not to an exceptionally early Scandinavian
prototype, but rather to contemporary Anglo-Saxon
traditions of shield manufacture.

DISCUSSION
This new association of the Irish Sea group with Anglo-Saxon rather than Scandinavian prototypes has
considerable implications for our understanding of

Scandinavian activity in the Irish Sea area. Perhaps

the most immediately obvious consequence is that
these bosses can no longer be taken as indications of
exceptionally early Viking activity. Instead each boss
of this type must be dated independently in order to
develop a chronology for the group as a whole. The
Millhill burial, for example, can no longer be dated
to the eighth century on the basis of its shield boss:
rather this Irish Sea A boss can be loosely dated to
the ninth century on the basis of the associated singleedged sword with crossbar (see above). In the case
of the Ormside boss, Bjrn and Shetelig (1940, 19)
eventually dated it to the second half of the ninth
century, using an associated sword hilt of Petersen
type M. This date may be slightly modified in the
light of recent research by Graham-Campbell (1992,
112) and others, which would suggest that Scandinavian activity in north-west England did not begin until around AD 900. The boss from Cronk Moar, on
the other hand, was found in the same grave as a
Petersen type S sword hilt, which could date from any
point in the ninth or tenth century (Bersu & Wilson
1966, 72). Hence the Irish Sea A type as a whole may
well have been in use throughout the period of pagan
Scandinavian burial in British Isles.
Perhaps the most precisely datable of the Irish Sea
B type bosses is the example from Kiloran Bay, on
Colonsay, where two Anglo-Saxon coins recovered
from the burial site give a certain terminus post quem of
AD 831 (Anderson 1907, 447). Recent research has
however suggested that these stycas had been demonetarised, and the burial as a whole has been redated to the late ninth or early tenth century (Graham-Campbell 1995, 157). The artifacts associated
with the Balladoole boss can be dated with even less
precision, but suggest a date of deposition in the ninth
century (Bersu & Wilson 1966, 86). The College
Green boss cannot be directly associated with any
other artifacts, and consequently cannot be dated independently, but the history of Dublin as a whole
would suggest that it must post-date AD 841, and is
unlikely to date from a point after the mid-tenth century (see above). Thus the Irish Sea B group can also
be broadly dated to the ninth and perhaps the early
tenth centuries, indicating that the two large conical
forms were in use simultaneously. These dates effectively correspond to the period of Scandinavian style

The Millhill Burial in Context

burial in the area (Shetelig 1954, 101ff) and confirm
that the Irish Sea types, despite their greater diversity
of form, are no more useful for dating than the contemporary hemispherical Scandinavian type R.562.
While this revised dating of the Irish Sea types has
a broad range however, it does at least conform to the
generally accepted chronology of Scandinavian style
burial in the area. In the light of this new evidence,
the Millhill burial in particular must be re-assessed.
In the past, a number of commentators have used
the burial as evidence for Scandinavian activity in the
Hebrides, and indeed the Irish Sea area, prior to the
infamous attack on Lindesfarne in AD 793 which traditionally marks the beginning of the Viking Age in
these islands (see above). When the Millhill burial is
redated to the ninth century however, there is no
longer any real evidence for Scandinavian activity off
the west coast of Scotland or in the Irish Sea area
before AD 800. It is however interesting to note that
the remaining artifactual evidence for eighth century
Scandinavian activity in Scotland gathered by Crawford (1987, 121) consists of a spear-head from Skaill
and a sword from Pierowall, both in the Orkney
archipelago. Debate on the earliest date for Scandinavian activity in this island group has always been
more intense than elsewhere, and is far beyond the
scope of this paper, but such activity would seem
rather more plausible to most observers than similar
activity further south. This is not simply because Orkney is considerably closer to Scandinavia than Arran,
but also because the archipelago lies outside the main
areas of interest of contemporary Irish and AngloSaxon sources something which cannot be said, for
example, of the western Isles, and Iona in particular
(Hughes 1972, 116135, 1468). While the possibility
of unrecorded early Scandinavian activity in these
areas is possible, the redating of the Millhill grave
means that such activity remains entirely hypothetical. Hence at one level, Sheteligs basic maxim that
the general conclusions that can be derived from the
Viking graves discovered in Great Britain and Ireland
are in perfect accordance with the recorded history
of the period (1945, 1) has been reinforced by this
redating.
At another level however, the new associations of
the Irish Sea group call this maxim into question. The
literary sources of the period, generally compiled by

75

churchmen, tend to focus on the pagan barbarism of

the Scandinavian raiders, and as a result stress their
isolation from the surrounding Christian cultural milieu (Sawyer 1994, 945). Traditional studies of pagan
graves have tended to confirm this view. By their very
nature, Scandinavian style burials accompanied by
grave-goods seem to exist in a kind of cultural vacuum generated by the absence of comparable grave
goods in contemporary Christian burials. As a result,
it has been proposed that pagan burials contain
nothing which would look particularly unusual in
Scandinavia itself, and that they essentially represent
only the first or second generation of (culturally isolated) Scandinavian settlers (Shetelig 1954, 90; Wilson
1976, 113). While recent research in both history and
archaeology has begun to challenge this model of
Scandinavians and indigenous populations as fundamentally opposed groups, a new stress on shared elements of culture has drawn increased attention to the
divide between pagan and Christian. According to
Roesdahl, for example, religion was the most important cultural distinction between Scandinavians and
foreigners (1991, 191). Hence religion is today perceived as a fundamental factor separating the insular
Scandinavians from the indigenous population, an
obstacle which had to be removed (through conversion) before any meaningful contact could take place.
The fundamental truth behind this principle can
hardly be denied, but in accepting the reality of the
division between pagan and Christian in the ninth
century, there is a real danger that it may be overstressed. From an historical perspective, for example,
there is abundant evidence that some native leaders,
such as the Irish king Cerball of Ossory, formed alliances with Scandinavian leaders while they were (almost certainly) still pagan (Smyth 1977, 13040). At
a more basic level, it should also be remembered that
the conversion of the Scandinavian population was
in itself the result of a certain level of contact and
assimilation. It is against this background of limited
contact that the presence of a fundamentally AngloSaxon shield boss type in pagan Scandinavian graves
should be evaluated.
The precise nature of this contact is of course
highly debatable. At the most basic level, it may indicate no more than the acquisition of an Anglo-Saxon
shield by a pagan Viking after one of the many violent

76

Acta Archaeologica

encounters for which there is no shortage of evidence

whatsoever. At the opposite extreme, the strong similarities in size and morphology between bosses in
each of the two groups, particularly the Irish Sea A
type, may indicate that the insular Scandinavian
population were producing these bosses themselves
(see above). Local production has indeed been suggested for the Irish Sea B boss from Balladoole, for
example (Bersu & Wilson 1966, 1617), while the
small Dublin type bosses were almost certainly produced in Dublin (Harrison 1995, 126). Between the
two extremes lie situations where Scandinavian settlers obtained these bosses, or chose to emulate the
Anglo-Saxon type of their own accord, as a result of
something other than simple brute force. Whatever
the means of acquisition, it should be remembered
that the adoption of these bosses seems to have been
something more than basic expediency. None of these
Irish Sea types have been found in an area traditionally associated with Anglo-Saxon burials or extensive
activity. Consequently the Scandinavian owners of
these bosses must have transported them over considerable distances, choosing to continue using these
artifacts in preference to a Scandinavian boss form.
In addition, it must be remembered that these boss
owners were also buried with these shields, an act
which seems to indicate an acceptance of this boss
type at a something more than purely functional level.
There will of course be many who will argue
against this interpretation, suggesting that the presence or absence of an artifact of insular rather than
Scandinavian origin in a pagan grave does not in itself
have any momentous cultural significance. There is
however a certain amount of evidence for contemporary awareness of the difference between hemispherical and conical bosses. The practice of interring damaged shield bosses in Viking Age burials has been
known in Scandinavia for a long time. While debate
on the source of this damage continues today, the fact
that such bosses are almost always associated with
cremation burials has led many commentators to suggest that the damage is ritual, rather than the result
of the final battles of the graves occupants (Shetelig
1945, 26). In the British Isles, there is also a tendency
to find such damaged bosses in association with crem-

ation burials, although there are exceptions to this

general rule (Kaland 1993, 314). What is perhaps
more significant in insular contexts is the fact that
all but three known hemispherical bosses have been
damaged prior to burial, while only one conical example (a small Dublin type) has provided evidence
of damage prior to oxidation (Harrison 1995, 1357).
While any attempt to explain this pattern must be
regarded as mere speculation, it is surely significant
that this pattern exists, and that it is so clearly defined.
By itself of course, this anomaly, like the broader
adoption or development of the large conical type,
neither proves nor disproves anything. On a broader
scale however, the evidence provided by the Irish Sea
group makes it clear that a general re-evaluation of
the nature and extent of cultural contact between the
earliest generations of pagan Scandinavians and the
local Christian population is called for. In the case of
many artifacts in particular, there is a real need to
examine their origins, development and cultural significance at a local as well as an international level,
despite the difficulties often generated by a lack of
direct comparative material. As scientific dating
methods continue to improve, the significance of artifacts as primary chronological indicators will almost
certainly decline. But as our knowledge of the chronological and general archaeological background improves, these artifacts may move beyond their current
role as cultural markers towards a newer role as inter-cultural indicators: symbols of contact and
change as much as continuity and stability. While
such a simple empirical model will undoubtedly be
shot down by the more extreme theorists, there is always the hope that the detailed study of such artifacts
as relics of a complex past can and will continue to
add new dimensions to our understanding of the early
Viking Age in these islands.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Floinn, T. OKeeffe and J.
I would like to thank T. B. Barry, R. O
Sheehan, all of whom were kind enough to comment on earlier
drafts of this paper. I am also grateful to C. Paterson (nee Richardson) for information on recent research carried out on the Millhill
finds. It need hardly be said that any remaining errors are entirely
my own fault.

The Millhill Burial in Context

77

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Authors address:
Department of Medieval History
Trinity College
Dublin 2
Ireland
harrisos/tdc.ie

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