Copper alloy sewing ring. From BS 1965-71, Brook Street section, Winchester, Hampshire.
Copper alloy sewing ring.
Late medieval, 14th-15th century.
Found during an excavation by the Winchester Excavation Committee in the Brooks area of Winchester in the late 1960s.
Rather than being cast like thimbles of later periods, this sewing ring is a strip of metal bent into a circle with hand-punched indentations. The open end leaves the fingertip free to grasp light objects, such as thread and pins, and prevents sweat. For more information, see Professor Martin Biddle's (1990) book Winchester Studies 7.ii, Objects and Economics in Medieval Winchester, catalog number 2502.