Good Health, Master Count, for Many Happy Years

A Byzantine bucket made of copper,
Buried in bits in an east British grave,
Engraved with North African hunting scenes
And the gift-giver’s inscription in Greek,
Likely made in an Antioch workshop
Fifteen-hundred years ago, give or take,
Only arriving in the British Isles
By way of trade a century later,

Is just one of the exotic items
Dug up at Sutton Hoo—the ship itself,
Jewels, silver, garnets from Sri Lanka--
Hoard of an Anglo-Saxon warrior king,
But who was the Master Count who received
The gift of a bucket in Byzantium
Wishing him health and happiness, who died
Sometime in dating's margin of error?