Identifying hair pins and combs

Bone pins, decorated heads, and composite combs from daily grooming.

Hair pins are long, slender, and usually bone or copper alloy with a decorated head — Roman examples run from plain knobs to carved busts and hands. Distinguish from sewing needles (which have eyes) and clothes fasteners (shorter, different wear). Glass and jet pins served the same fashion.

Combs tell period by construction: one-piece boxwood or bone; composite combs of tooth-plates riveted between connecting bars (typical early medieval and Viking, often with ring-and-dot ornament); double-sided fine/coarse combs for grooming and delousing across many eras.

Pins: record length, head form, and material. Combs: count teeth per centimetre on each side, note rivet materials, and photograph ornament. Broken tooth-plates look like blank bone slips — check for saw marks and rivet holes before discarding an 'unworked' fragment.

From the guide library inside Collectors Catalogues, a free app for cataloguing antiques and finds with honest, museum-grade records.

More on jewellery

Dating medieval brooches — Form, pin, and section are your clues.

Identifying brooch and fibula types — Spring, bow, and catch.

Identifying finger rings — Hoop, shoulders, and bezel.

Identifying beads — Material, perforation, and wear.

Identifying cameos and intaglios — Carved in relief or sunk.

Identifying earrings — Hoops, pendants, and wires from four thousand years of pierced ears.

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