The _fyancel_ or wedding ring appears to be of Roman origin, and was usually given at the betrothal as a pledge of the engagement. Two forms of these rings are the "gimmel" and the "posy" rings. Gimmel rings (French, _jumelle_, a twin) are composed of two hoops forming, when closed, one ring, and so constructed as to play when open one within the other. They are of two sorts: those which are either plain or set with precious stones, and those which have the device of the _fede_ or two right hands joined. Inscriptions or mottoes, as a rule in Norman-French, are to be found on rings of the fourteenth, and more frequently on those of the fifteenth century. They were called "chansons" and also "resons" or "reasons," and later, poesies, posies, or posys. These love inscriptions, generally engraved on the outside of the ring (though placed inside in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) are for the most part the same as those found on the brooches of the time, inscriptions such as _Je suis ici en lieu d'ami_, and the like, being of frequent occurrence. More rarely the motto is in English, as on the beautiful iconographic gold ring in the British Museum. New Year's Day among the Romans was a _dies faustus_ and objects of jewellery were usually among the presents which it was the custom to exchange on that occasion. In the Middle Ages also the advent of the New Year was celebrated by the bestowal of presents. Among these _estrennes_ jewellery was a prominent item, and on the rings of the period (like the one figured on p. 150) the inscription, _en bon an_ frequently occurs. A very extensive group of mediæval finger rings is formed by signets. These are marked with some device, such as an animal, a bird, a tree, or any other object, so that they could be easily recognised; hence they were often given as credentials to a messenger. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries rings of silver, and occasionally of gold, occur, with a crest or coat-of-arms, or with devices in the form of initials, and certain arbitrary signs called merchants' marks, which were used by merchants and others not entitled to armorial bearings. Piers Plowman speaks of "merchantes merkes ymedeled in glasse." Such rings were often worn on the thumb. Though armorial signets were worn in Italy as early as the fourteenth century, they were not common in England till the commencement of the sixteenth. Somewhat similar are certain devotional signet rings of silver or base metal engraved with an initial--generally the letter I surmounted by a coronet. The I is probably the initial of the Saviour's name, such rings being worn from a belief in the efficacy of holy names as preservatives from evil.