Maschen disc brooch

Maschen disc brooch
Year	9th century AD
Type	Brooch
Medium	Vitreous enamel on copper and loam
Subject	Animal
Dimensions	30 mm diameter (1.2 in)
Location	Archäologisches Museum Hamburg, Maschen
Owner	Archäologisches Museum Hamburg

The Maschen disc brooch is an Early Medieval fibula, which was found in 1958 during archaeological excavations of the late Saxon grave field near Maschen, in the Lower Saxony district of Harburg, Germany. On its face side, the fibula shows an unidentified saint with a halo. It was found in a woman's grave of the beginning of the Christianization of northern Germany, and is in the permanent exhibition of the Archaeological Museum Hamburg in Harburg, Hamburg.

The cemetery was located on the western fringes of the Hallonen, an approximately 63-metre-high (207 ft) mountain range which is running out on the 23-metre-high (75 ft) Fuchsberg some 1,200 metres (3,900 ft) southeast of the village center of Maschen. During sand extraction from the Fuchsberg for the construction of the nearby Bundesautobahn 1, two Bronze Age tumuli were discovered in 1958.

The following excavations revealed that both grave mounds were disturbed to the undisturbed ground. Except for a few ceramic vessel shards and a razor from several later burials on the hill, no further findings were recorded. While pushing off the humuslayer 20 metres (66 ft) north of the tumuli, the first late Saxon flat graves appeared in the ground. Additionally some soil discolorations appeared at a brim of the sand mine some 80 metres (260 ft) east, indicating burial pits. During the initially launched rescue excavation, the complete burial site were excavated and documented in a three-week operation. It was the first fully documented late Saxon burial site of northern Germany so far with a total of 210 examined burials.

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