The Dunstable Swan Jewel is a gold and enamel brooch in the form of a swan made in England or France in about 1400 and now in the British Museum, where it is on display in Room 40. The jewel was excavated in 1965 on the site of Dunstable Friary in Bedfordshire, and is presumed to have been intended as a livery badge given by an important figure to his supporters; the most likely candidate was probably the future Henry V of England, who was Prince of Wales from 1399.
The Dunstable Swan Jewel, a livery badge, about 1400. British Museum
The Wilton Diptych (c. 1395–99), showing Richard II and the angels wearing Richard's livery badge of the White Hart.
The white boar badge of Richard III as pendant to a Yorkist livery collar on the tomb monument of Sir Ralph Fitzherbert (died 1483) in Norbury, Derbyshire.
Another view
Vitreous enamel, also called porcelain enamel, is a material made by fusing powdered glass to a substrate by firing, usually between 750 and 850 °C. The powder melts, flows, and then hardens to a smooth, durable vitreous coating. The word vitreous comes from the Latin vitreus, meaning "glassy".
Gothic châsse; 1185–1200; champlevé enamel over copper gilded; height: 17.7 cm (7.0 in), width: 17.4 cm (6.9 in), depth: 10.1 cm (4.0 in)
Chinese dish with scalloped rim, from the Ming dynasty; early 15th century; cloisonné enamel; height: 2.5 cm, diameter: 15.2 cm
Staffordshire Moorlands Pan, 2nd-century Roman Britain
Detail of painted Limoges enamel dish, mid-16th century, attributed to Jean de Court
