Indian Glass Beads in Western and North Europe in Early Middle Age

In recent years, chemical analyses of glass beads excavated from late Antique and Early Middle Age sites in western and north-western Europe (France, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark, Germany and Sweden) have revealed for the first time the presence of two groups of glass beads with unexpected compositions for these periods and geographic areas. The first group is composed of tiny (less than 1.5 mm in diameter) glass beads recovered from Merovingian (mid-fifth/sixth century CE) graves located in Western Europe. Although their chromatic spectrum is varied: green (more than 6300 examples), orange with a red core (233 examples), black (184 examples), yellow (18 examples), slightly translucent ‘milky’ white (5 examples) and red (3 examples), we observe a predominance of green beads (93%) which may express a preference for this colour. Up to now, only beads recovered in France, Belgium and Switzerland have been analysed. But according to their particular typology, these beads have also been identified in The Netherlands, Germany and Spain. Their glass has a high-alumina soda composition which was proven to be identical with the one identified by Dussubieux for small drawn ‘Indo-Pacific’ beads produced in southern India and Sri Lanka from the fourth century BCE through the eleventh century CE (composition referenced as m-Na-Al 1, Dussubieux et al. in J Archaeol Sci 37:1646–1655, 2010). The second group is composed of large opaque red or orange barrel-shaped beads (c. 10–12 mm in diameter) found in early seventh century graves in north-western Europe. The beads studied here originate mainly from Denmark (Ribe and Sandegard—Bornholm island), Sweden (Helgo and several sites on Gotland island) and Germany (Frankfurt Harheim). Most of the analysed beads from this period were made from recycled Roman glass. However, some of them, only made with red and orange glasses, show a composition which differs from all known Western European glasses in both main components composition and colouring recipe. Their trace element pattern, although not identical, shows several similarities with those of South Asian glasses.