Spheres of minerals (usually quartz but I've seen others) set in gold, silver or copper-alloy slings are not uncommon finds in the graves of high-ranking Merovingian and Kentish women. They're often paired with pierced silver spoons. I've collected a bunch of pictures of them over on a Pinterest board, and I decided to try and make one. I bought a 1.25" diameter quartz sphere at Pennsic, and finally got around to slinging it up.
Very early efforts were just loops of wire, like this guy here. The copper and brass craft wire I was using was having none of it - I couldn't get it secure enough that I didn't think the wire would just slip to the side and eject the ball at the first excuse. So my next step, rather than "go buy thicker wire," was to twist two wires together and make the sling from that.
Cut for enormous pictures...
There's a nickel for size. Two ends of the wires are bend and wrapped to form a suspension loop; the other two are twisted around the sling wires to hold them in place.
It's very shiny and gold and crystal... and little like any of the finds I'm aware of.
I am not up for hot metalworking at this point. I had some 0.005" thick pewter foil left from the Roman curse tablet project, so I decided to see what I could do with that, some jewelry glue, and a 1.5" diameter mineral specimen of labradorite that I've owned for some time.
Oh yeah! That's more like it!
I cut two narrow bands of foil, then used the edge of a metal ruler and my fingernails to roll in the edges. (Note: this will destroy your fingernails.) The cap is another strip of foil with a sort of "flag" on one end. The band wraps around the four prongs of the sling, and the "flag" folds down over the top as a cap. I poked holes for the suspension ring, which also holds the wraparound part closed.
The suspension ring is more silver-tone copper craft wire (20 gauge, I think), with the standard treatment of the ends.
The two bands of the sling are secured with a dab of jewelry glue where they overlap. Looking at the pictures of the finds, I think most of them are soldered to a central boss of some kind. I wouldn't be surprised if some were riveted, but the soldering means that both straps are in contact with the stone. When they overlap, one is closer to the stone and one is stacked up on top of it - not optimal. However, working with the very thin metal foil (and flattening out the rolled decoration at that point) made it not much of an issue.
I haven't done any reading on these balls, as far as construction, thickness, etc. - just looked at the pictures. And the laboradorite ball is clearly a 10-foot rule sort of object - even if the simple straps are supported by some of the less luxurious finds, my cap is positively primitive compared to the other survivors.
I've bought some 0.005" brass plate, and I think I'll make a "gold" sling for the quartz after the style of the laboradorite one.
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