We are thrilled to announce that the Dawlish Hoard has gone on show at RAMM this month.
The Dawlish Hoard was discovered in 2017 by metal-detectorists in a boggy field near Dawlish. It had lain buried for about 3,000 years.
The hoard is now the centrepiece of a new display in the Courtyard Wall. Eight other recent groups of Bronze Age finds are also featured. The Dawlish Hoard stands out with its unique combination of gold and bronze objects. This is different to the groups of bronze objects usually found.
All the finds show the pattern of metalwork being chopped up or deliberately damaged prior to burial. The gold bracelets were intentionally folded, and the ingots and weapons purposely broken. We don’t know why for certain, but there may have been a practice of ritually ‘killing’ the power of objects. It is possible that they were made as offerings to gods or ancestors.
RAMM’s Conservation Team have carefully cleaned and stabilised each object for display. Conservator Sarah Klopf worked on two axe fragments and a section of bronze sword. Student placements Leonor Mozo Alonso and Kate Berlewen worked on the four gold bracelets and eleven copper alloy ingots.
The gold bracelets are strips of gold with coiled terminals. Kate and Leonor removed soil on the surfaces and inside the delicate coils. They used brushes, bamboo skewers and hawthorns with deionised water and industrial denatured alcohol.
The copper alloy ingots and weapon fragments were cleaned with scalpels, glass bristle brushes, and industrial denatured alcohol applied with cotton swabs. This revealed the various copper corrosion products present, as well as details about the objects.
None of this work would have been possible without the generosity of our supporters who raised the full £12,000 required to buy, conserve and display the Dawlish Hoard. We look forward to sharing this incredible treasure with the people of Devon and beyond for generations to come.
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