Prepared in cooperation with the Institute for the History of Material Culture of Russian
Academy of Sciences the present book brings together research papers on small lead seals of
Drohiczyn type from Polish and East European finds. The first discoveries of these objects
which have a broad dating of 11th-13th centuries go back to the 1860s. Despite this their
function and significance within the East Central and Eastern European societies continue to be
poorly understood.The first volume opens with a description of the small urban centre of
Drohiczyn now found in eastern Poland and an analysis of the problem of literary evidence for
small lead seals from eastern Europe. Subsequent chapters focus on material evidence. Some of
the small lead seals addressed in the monograph are now housed in museum collections (St.
Petersburg Ermitage Cracow Warsaw) others have surfaced more recently in Belarus' Poland
Russia and Ukraine. One of the highlights is a chapter reporting on the dendrochronology
studies of small lead seals from Novgorod. The description of individual case studies is
introduced by a monumental chapter on the topography of small lead seals from over 30 000
finds. A separate part of the book discusses issues related to the iconography of the small
lead seals of Drohiczyn type.The second volume opens with a description of the archaeological
site at Czermno. In the format adopted in the Catalogue of the corpus of small lead seals from
Czermno their photographic images are published side by side with the written entries. Most of
the small lead seals from Czermno are forms characteristic for Eastern European environment
except for a commercial cloth seal of Tournai (Belgium) the focus of a separate extensive
research paper. Next to several contributions from archaeologists some chapters were
contributed by representatives of technical sciences presenting research methods used in the
study of lead seals and the result of analysis of theirfinds from Czermno and Drohiczyn (the
latter now housed in museum collections in Bialystok Cracow Drohiczyn and Warsaw).Individual
analyses are the result of an international co-operation of researchers from Poland Germany
Belarus' Russia and Ukraine pursued within the projects: Seals at the Borders Seals in
Context: Seals and Dorogichin-Type Seals from Czermno Cherven' Towns (Dumbarton Oaks Center)
The Sphinx of Slavic sigillography - Dorogichin seals from Czermno in their East European
context (National Science Centre Project No. 2013 11 B HS3 0205) and of the scientific
activity of Department I (Man and Environment) and Department II (Culture and Imagination) of
Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO).
