Glass cone beaker with a pointed base, made from pale greeen glass. It is decorated with thin trails of glass in a spiral around the neck and in long loops down the body. This beaker was found in a grave in the Anglo-Saxon cemetery in Mitcham. Glass vessels like this were rare and expensive and show the person buried was of high status. This beaker was probably imported from France, Belgium or Germany and shows the new culture that the Anglo-Saxons were bringing with them from the continent. Cone beakers could have been used at feasts. Because they have no bases, drinkers had to down the contents (ale, cider, mead or wine) in one go and then rest the beakers upside down on their rims.

400 AD - 550 AD

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