The terminal brooch fragment you're describing, despite being incomplete, is considered one of the finest surviving pieces from the Viking era in terms of both artistry and craftsmanship. It features a silver sphere, albeit slightly wrinkled, which was cast from a hollow alloy. Nearly the entire surface of this sphere is adorned with intricate blacksmithing in the early Viking style known as Jellinge/Mammen.
The primary decorative element is raised twisted gold wire that forms a trefoil-shaped ring pattern on a raised, round gold panel. Adjacent to this central motif, there are two triangular gold panels filled with spikes, and one of them includes a medallion adorned with serpentine tendrils.
This terminal brooch exhibits typological and aesthetic similarities to similar artifacts found in a large Viking silver hoard at Eketorp, Sweden, discovered in 1950 and 1955. These items, which include the terminal brooch and pin heads, are now housed in the Örebro Lance Regional Museum, situated west of Stockholm. Much of the Eketorp hoard, like your described artifact, consists of silver pieces that were broken or fragmented during and after the Viking period, often as part of monetary exchange practices.
If fully restored to its original form, this impressive brooch would have ranked among the largest and heaviest known in Viking-era Europe, indicating that its first owner held a significant and important position during that time.
