Those crazy
Avars....
The problem is that they
had lots of decorations that look very similar.
Yours are not strap ends. They are belt decorations. You can see what they basically are if you look at the B&W
schematic you have posted. They are on the wide
part of the belt - which was at the wearer's back. Thou gh yours are a different
style from the ones in the
schematic.
Avar belt sets consist of some or all of the following:
Buckles - sometimes plain, but often with a built-in decorated plate.
Three
types of Belt Plates:
- Tiny plates for any
part of the belt. These were usually triangular, pointed, or half-round and
had small holes for attachment and maybe a big hole for decoration.
- Medium-sized plates for the thin
part of the belt.
- Medium-sized plates with hinges and small pendants for the wide
part of the belt. The plate is usually the same as the normal medium plate but has a hinge at the bottom. The tiny pendant is often confusingly similar to the tiny plates, but has a hinge at the top.
Two
types of Strap Ends:
- Several medium-sized strap ends for the short leather strapletts that hung down from the belt.
- One large strap end for the end of the belt itself.
The
type of decoration (animal, floral, vegetal, etc.) varied over time.
So did the shape of the belt plates. They began as rectangular, then oval or shield-shaped, and finally they were the same shape as the strap ends.
So yours are the late
type of belt plate. The large plates were attached to the belt with two rivets. The small pendants just hung down. The holes were simply for decoration. The purpose was likely to jingle and make noise....
SC
