Tortoise brooches were used by Viking women to fasten their apron dresses/hangeroks while wearing them. However, besides a practical function, they also had a decorative function. Viking women used their tortoise brooches as a place to hang everyday items, so they were at hand.
Depending on your preference, you can keep your tortoise brooches plain, decorate them a bit, or go all out and embellish them richly.
Strings of Beads
A common way to decorate tortoise brooches was by hanging strings of beads between them. You can attach just one string to your brooches, or three, or many more. In the Viking Age, these beads were generally made from glass, amber and tin. Sometimes they were made from metals like bronze or silver.
One way to attach these strings is by simply fastening them directly to the brooches, by attaching them to the pin, or by tying the strings to a small ring and sliding that onto the pin.
If you want to attach multiple strings, you can also attach them to a jewelry spacer and then attach the spacer to the brooches.
Practical Everyday Items
Contrary to what they do in most modern pop culture, Vikings cared a lot about personal hygiene. It was common for women to wear things like nail cleaners, ear spoons and small combs on their tortoise brooches.
Other everyday items they attached to their brooches were small knives, keys, sewing equipment, tweezers, etc.
These items could be hung directly from the brooch on a chain that ended in a small hook. Or by attaching those chains to a jewelry spacer and attaching the spacer to one of the brooches.
Check out here our tortoise brooches.
You can find our personal hygiene items here.
And our historical sewing supplies here.
