I've written several posts about archaeological discoveries in the Old World, where people find swords in streams, use metal detectors to find caches of coins in farmer's fields, and find kings buried under parking lots.
With much less history to dig up, the North American continent doesn't provide as much buried booty. But in Jamestown, Virginia, there is some history stretching back a few centuries, and in a dig there, in the "Governor's Well", they found a sword. Not just any sword, though -- this one was made by a legendary swordmaker, and he even put his mark on it.
Conservation and research of a marked sword blade from the Governor’s Well
"Bricks discarded in the well were cemented to the iron blade by corrosion as it lay in the moist ground for 400 years.
Some of the sword fragments after an initial dry-brushing. As soon as excavators brought the sword into the lab from the field, it was dry-brushed and cataloged. Based on its measurements, it is likely a broadsword.
Conservators x-rayed the fragments, which revealed a maker’s mark on one side, which included letters, symbols, and possibly a number. Since this is the first marked sword blade from all of Rediscovery’s excavations, the reveal was exhilarating! The name “FERARA” appears one above the other within each of the blade’s fullers — along with an unknown symbol before the letter F and after the final A."
Like so:
After all the conservation, they got the brick off and it looks like this. It is being very carefully curated.
No comments:
Post a Comment