Cloth Seal, German, Ulm, Inscription, Image & Found by Mariusz Ciepluch.
Found on the Thames Foreshore, 20mm.
ULM in Gothic script, ornate design above // missing but rivet stub has partial stamp of shield bearing the arms of Ulm
A better example of this version of the Ulm cloth seal can be seen at Euro-Plombs where it is suggested there might be a 16 on the left of the upper part of the shield indicating a 17th century date.
"BSG.CS.01162 records a seal of the same design but the ox (shown on the page quoted) is replaced with a lion. UKDFD 18277 shows an Ulm seal with the letters SAV surviving on the rivet stub. PAS SUSS-7D0705 shows another cloth seal with a banner bearing the town’s name instead of an ox. A similar seal is recorded from an excavation of Fast Castle near Dunbar, Scotland [Mitchell, K.L., Murdoch, K.B., & Ward, J.R., 2001, (Egan, G.) p.137, illus.67], where it states, “From the late 14th century there was a municipal inspection in the city, which became the centre of a wide hinterland of production of the local fustians made of cotton and linen. By the early 16th century over 100,000 pieces annually were sealed there, rising to a peak of over 430,000 in 1601. These were mainly inexpensive black or white fabrics, most pieces being 18 yards(16.5m) long. In the late 16th century the weaving of heavier bombazines with hemp warp and cotton weft began in Ulm, resulting in complaints of a decline in quality, and no fustians were inspected after 1660. In England, Ulm textiles were known as ‘holmes’ from a corruption of the placename, and their import is frequently attested in the late 16th and early 17th century documents. It is therefore remarkable that apparently no Ulm seal has been recorded in England.” The seal above and those recorded on PAS and UKDFD have since put this omission to rights but these seals are still surprisingly rare compared to the large numbers of Augsburg seals recorded, which were also attached to fustians." Elton, Cloth Seals, Archaeopress, 1917, p.302.
