Early Anglo-Saxon Christian Reliquaries

Anthony Gibson assembles a corpus of seventy-one small copper-alloy containers from forty-nine sites across Anglo-Saxon England, dating principally to the seventh and possibly eighth centuries. Often labelled work boxes, needle cases, amulet containers or reliquaries, the objects have long posed problems of identification and function.

Gibson develops a typology, examines materials, construction and decoration and provides catalogue entries for the surviving examples. His interpretation distinguishes three types. Gibson argues that Types I and II had Christian functions and should be regarded as reliquaries. He interprets Type III as secular, but its precise purpose remains uncertain.