Any Ideas? Brass Thingy

[Tony Two-Cent]

I found this in the corn field today where I had previously found the 1875 Indian Head Cent. It is heavy brass.

Dave (Full Metal Digger) suggested that it might be some kind of leather strap buckle. That seems logical.

I haven't cleaned it yet but I think it will have a nice patina on it.

Any guesses?

[OxShoeDrew]

Horse medallion? with a nice bottle opener on yours

[Tony Two-Cent]

Bottle opener is the first thing I thought of!

Otherwise, it sure does look like those horse medallions.

[Digger_O'Dell]

Easy-That's a cinch buckle. We had similar on a couple vintage cinches that we only used for shows as they were antique and impossible to replace if one broke or got lost. There were 2 in a set, for either side of the horse. The modern ones almost always had a center pin for the buckle to attach to a hole punched leather strap from the saddle. But the oldest ones we had were permanently attached by a riveted leather loop at either end of the cinch, then attached to the saddle (going under the horse) to a leather strap that was wound a couple times between the saddle and cinch, then tied so as to not come loose. Yeah, a loose cinch usually ended in having a very bad day for the rider. Just having a tied leather strap couldn't guarantee the saddle staying tight through a long day of riding, so they were eventually upgraded to the modern style.

[Tony Two-Cent]

Easy-That's a cinch buckle. We had similar on a couple vintage cinches that we only used for shows as they were antique and impossible to replace if one broke or got lost. There were 2 in a set, for either side of the horse. The modern ones almost always had a center pin for the buckle to attach to a hole punched leather strap from the saddle. But the oldest ones we had were permanently attached by a riveted leather loop at either end of the cinch, then attached to the saddle (going under the horse) to a leather strap that was wound a couple times between the saddle and cinch, then tied so as to not come loose. Yeah, a loose cinch usually ended in having a very bad day for the rider. Just having a tied leather strap couldn't guarantee the saddle staying tight through a long day of riding, so they were eventually upgraded to the modern style.

Thanks for the very useful information! I had trouble finding one like it with a Google search, probably because I didn't know what to search for.