This exquisite little object, made from Silver and Gold is a personal sundial and dates from early medieval times. It's exhibited at Canterbury Cathedral which we visited last weekend, it was discovered during excavations of the Great Cloister in 1938, experts estimate that it dates from the 10th century, which if true, make it the oldest known personal timepiece in existence, quite a thing!
It's difficult to make out in the hasty picture that I snapped (above) so there's a close up below, nicked from the interwebs..
It's quite a sophisticated instrument and because of the positional nature of sundials it only works accurately in Canterbury! It functions via the insertion of the pin into the various holes, according to the time of year, and then by holding the object up via the chain facing the Sun, the shadow of the pin points (roughly) to the current time of day. The inscriptions on the sides of the dial are in Latin (obvs) and translated mean ‘Health to my maker, peace to my owner.’, I love the way the craftsman who made it got an eternal plug for himself in there!
The maker is reputed to be St. Dunstan (909-988 AD) who, not only was a talented Silversmith was also a senior English clergyman who eventually became the Archbishop of Canterbury and also served as a minister of state to several English kings, he sounds like a pretty handy bloke to have around!
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