Collecting Jamestown: Part 9. Sixpence Benders

Love token "benders" found at Jamestown.
Note the S-shaped bends: up and down.

Several sixpences have been excavated at Jamestown, some of them bent.
   All of these coins have been Elizabethan issues. They are the most common silver denomination unearthed in and around the fort. The sixpence is also the largest coin found at Jamestown (but for a small cut piece of a shilling).

But something else is at play here: most of the sixpences are mutilated in some way. Herein the intrigue begins.

There is a tradition of bending objects in England. When an object is bent, it is "killed." This allows the object -- or coin in this case -- to pass into the otherworld. Sounds strange doesn't it? But coins were frequently bent during hard times when making a vow of pilgrimage to a saint in return for a miracle.
   Consequently, when a coin is bent and a vow is made, there is chance that the saint might intervene to help a sick family member. There are several post-medieval references to the bending of silver pennies over ailing family members. The bent coin was then taken on a pilgrimage to the respective shrine of that saint and left as an offering. Reportedly, many folks were healed in this way.

Love token found by metal
detectorist in the UK.
Upper left corner bends down,
lower right corner bends up.

   It was important that the bent coin, not any other, was left at the shrine. Or else, the benefit of the vow might be undone. Hence, bending had the practical aspect of making sure that the coin was not lost or mistakenly spent.
   As the Reformation chased out many of these "Old Church" practices, the bending of coins took on a more secular meaning. As Ralph Merrifield put it in his wonderful book, The Archaeology of Ritual and Magic: "Bending a coin had always been regarded as a symbol of devotion and of a vow; when worship of the saints was condemned as idolatrous, it was re-directed to a secular purpose, and bent coins came to be used as love tokens."
   The English love tokens of the seventeenth century are commonly known as "benders." The tradition continued for at least 200 years before engraved love tokens became a popular alternative.

The two sixpence benders found at Jamestown are dated 1573 and 1593. The first one was found in the cellar of a longhouse known as the "Factory." This building dated between 1608 to 1610 and was used for crafting and trading; it may also have been a storehouse. This was where the so-called "witch bottle (mentioned last May) was found. The latter sixpence was found in an unsealed context within the fort. Both pieces exhibit the characteristic up and down bends (forming a mild S-shape).