The garnets were long gone by the time Theophilus was writing, in the 12thC, but he describes many techniques that descend from the corpus (or corpse?) of Germanic metalwork, indicating that the church absorbed some of the manufacturing systems.

Strangest of all, when the style does decline, it is connected to the general decline in furnished burials...but it isn't as simple as a newly Christian elite casting off barbaric trappings.

Gold and garnet cloisonné becomes associated with female dress and burial, as well as reliquaries...etc.

A decorative style that originates in Late Antiquity, in the eastern Mediterranean and around the Black Sea, and is carried west during the early Migration era, strongly associated with male burial, until the style declines in the 7th century.

I'm not sure. The gold/garnet combo had such a long history in NW Europe, and by the 7thC it might have been considered very local. The garnets came from distant places, but it's not clear if the owners of the objects knew that.

The Harpole pendant is an interesting hinge, presumably half of some other hinged object. Almost all hinges from Antiquity/Early Medieval are arranged symmetrically, but the Harpole example is offset, with a gap on the left hand side.

I'm always amazed by the persistence of this style of adornment and burial. In the 7th century, the people who performed the Harpole burial would have recognised the objects in the Wolfsheim burial without any difficulty, although the meanings attached to them might have changed over time.

I once had a conversation about who might have made a particularly complex object. The university team thought it must be a group of specialists working together, but there was a rival theory about a polymath with a couple of assistants.

"How many assistants does your rival have?"

"Two."

Are you familiar with the hypothesis that archaeologists ultimately see themselves in the things they study? If Stonehenge is supposed to create unity, then unify behind me!

Dress for the mid-life crisis you want!

Cringing at the memory of my teenage self, and my mum doing everything in her power to get me to dress like my dad. I don't think she was even aware that she was doing it.

The motif of the hair braid is interesting. IIRC, it's often associated with Frigg, and it makes me wonder if the choice of knots in more complicated interlace designs might have their own associations that we don't understand.

Across the book, and the centuries, he mostly uses charters to examine very complicated relationships between people and places, rulers and populations. Not a feudal or manorial system until the end of the period (pre- and post-conquest).

I recently read Stenton's 'Anglo-Saxon England' (1971), and found the discussion of overkingship really interesting. IMO, he describes it as an important, traditional social role, rather than a title or office, and is dismissive of 'bretwalda' - poetic flourish rather than a real title.

PS. I am currently reading a certain book, about little kingdoms in Early Medieval Britain.

I read Westward to Vinland last year - more travelogue than archaeology, but it does include some interesting discussion about the sagas. It's very striking that when the Vikings arrived, the indigenous cultures of the Artic were already intercontinental.