In the same collection is a slight silver ring, with narrow and flat band
to hoop, surmounted by a circular signet; on the hoop is this inscription,
in relief, between lines raised along each edge, headed and ended by small
flowers, ‘M S D MONSERRATA.’ On the signet, also in relief, appears a
double-handled stone-mason’s saw (_serra_), the Latin for which furnished
the key to this monkish riddle; it reads thus, ‘Mater Sancta de
Monserrata,’ or Holy Mother of Monserrat, in Spain, where there was a
chapel dedicated to the Virgin, and this is, probably, the ring of a
pilgrim to that shrine.
At the meeting of the Archæological Institute at Norwich in 1847 some
curious examples of religious rings (of silver) were exhibited, connected,
most probably, with charms and superstitions. A ring dating about the
period of Henry VI. is engraved with the figure of a female saint, and the
symbols of the five wounds. Another, of the same age, found at Fransham,
has the hoop swaged or twisted; on the angular facets had been engraved
figures of saints. The engraving on another ring was ‘+Maria+Anna+Ih’us.’
Amongst the rich collection of rings lent by Mr. R. H. Soden Smith to the
Loan Exhibition of Ancient and Modern Jewellery at the South Kensington
Museum in 1872, were six rings, gold and silver, of the iconographic type,
having for the most part figures of saints engraved on the bezel, one
inscribed within, in Gothic letters, ‘yspartir+canc+dec+’ (_partir sans
désir_).
In the ‘Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall’ (Sept. 1875) is a
note on an ancient signet-ring found at Penryn by Mr. W. H. Tregelles:
‘This ring was found a few years since in a field near Budock church, by a
watchmaker of the neighbourhood, of whom I bought it for Mr. Octavius
Morgan, F.S.A., late M.P. for Monmouthshire. It has been the subject of
much interesting discussion, the result of which, with a description of
the ring, and three impressions in hard wax, I have deposited in the
Museum of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, at Truro.
‘It is an oriental ring of silver, set with an oblong sard, engraved; it
appears at one time to have been gilt, and the loop and back of the bezel
were ornamented with a small pattern in niello, now almost obliterated by
long wear.
‘In the middle of the device is a cartouche, or escutcheon, terminating at
the top in a Greek cross potent. In the lower part of the escutcheon is
engraved a paschal lamb, and in the upper part are some oriental
characters, which have not been deciphered with certainty. On either side
of the escutcheon is some ornamental scroll-work, having in the middle the
Jerusalem cross potent.
‘It was submitted to Mr. Albert Way and Mr. C. W. King; and the latter
gentleman, who took much pains to make out the inscription, considered
that the characters were Servian, and that they represent the name of some
ecclesiastic of the Greek Church to whom it once belonged.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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