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164 to the bishop of Sherborne of that name, A.D. 817—867, who was the chief counsellor of Ethelwulf. These relics supply admirable illustrations of the champ-levé process, as practised in the ninth century.

More precious even than the ring of Ethelwulf is an example of a somewhat different process of enamelling upon gold, the jewel of Alfred, now preserved in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. This ornament was discovered in 1693 near Athelney abbey, in a part of Somersetshire which had often been visited by Alfred, and to which he had retreated when worsted by the Danes, A.D. 878. It is formed of gold, elaborately wrought in a peculiar kind of filigree, mixed with chased and engraved work. The legend around the edge of the jewel, ✠ AELFRED MEC HEHT GEVVRCAN, (Aelfred Ordered me to be wrought,) is cut in bold characters, the intervening spaces being pierced, so that the crystal within is seen. The face is formed of a piece of rock-crystal, four-tenths of an inch in