Sheath & chape

leather knife sheath with two leather linings and a copper-alloy chape. The front and back of the sheath are decorated with panels of impressed and stabbed linear and foliate motifs. The panels are separated on the front by a moulded horizontal ridge. There is an extension or wing to one side with two suspension slots. There is a centre back seam edge/grain stitch holes. The inner sheaths extend above the outer sheath and are for the main blade and a smaller, narrower blade or implement. The smaller sheath has grain surface outwards and both have seams with edge/grain stitch holes.

The copper-alloy chape is plain and is made from folded sheet metal with an overlapping soldered seam at the back. There is also a decorative band around the upper part of the chape, which may also have helped to strengthen it. The chape narrows to a rounded point, made by notching the lower edges of the sheet metal and folding them in. A similar chape from York (but without its leather sheath) comes from a deposit dated from the early 15th century to the 16th century (Ottaway and Rogers 2002, 2904, fig 1478, no. 12891). However, this piece looks like something that may have been made at a later date from a cut down, cobbled earlier object.