XII. LEAF-SHAPED SWORDS…

XII. LEAF-SHAPED SWORDS

AMONG ancient weapons of bronze, perhaps the most remarkable both for elegance of form and for the skill displayed in their casting are the leaf-shaped swords, of which a considerable number have come down to our times. The only other forms that can vie with them in these respects are the spear-heads, of which many are gracefully proportioned, while the coring of their sockets for the reception of the shafts would do credit to the most skilful modern founder. Neither the one nor the other belong to the earliest period[1003] when bronze first came into general use for weapons and tools, the flat celts and knife-daggers characteristic of that period being as a rule absent from the hoards in which fragments of swords and spear-heads are present.

There is also this remarkable circumstance attaching to the bronze swords, viz., that there is no well-authenticated instance[1004] of their occurrence with any interments in barrows. It is true that Professor Daniel Wilson[1005] speaks of the frequent discovery of broken swords with sepulchral deposits, and mentions one found alongside of a cinerary urn in a tumulus at Memsie, Aberdeenshire, and another which lay beside a human skeleton in a cist under Carlochan Cairn, Carmichael, Galloway. But one of these discoveries took place so long ago as 1776, and in both cases there may, as Canon Greenwell has suggested, either have been some mistake as to the manner of finding, or the connection of the sword with the interment may have been apparent rather than real. A portion of a sword 6½ inches long, said to have been found in a cairn at Ballagan,[1006] Strathblane, Stirlingshire, in 1788, is in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. A “sarcophagus with ashes” is said to have been in the cairn. Another sword, broken in four pieces, is said to have been found in a barrow in Breconshire.[1007] Another, found at Wetheringsett, Suffolk, is said to have lain fourteen feet deep in clay, with a great number of human bones, but no pottery or other remains. In this case, however, there is no mention of a barrow. The sword is elsewhere said to have been found in a sandpit.[1008]

In Scandinavia, however, bronze swords have not unfrequently been found with interments in barrows; and inasmuch as the owners of the bronze swords in Britain were, after death, in all probability interred, either in a burnt or unburnt condition, there appears no reason why in some instances their swords may not have been buried with them, though as yet the evidence of these weapons having been found in tumuli, is far from satisfactory. Possibly at the time when the swords were in use the practice of erecting mounds over graves had ceased, and there are now no external marks upon the ground to indicate the graves of the warriors who wielded the bronze swords, and who have thus escaped disturbance in their “narrow cells” from the hands of treasure-seekers and archæologists; or possibly the custom of burying weapons with the dead may at that time have ceased.

But not only has there been a question, as to what was the method of interment in vogue among the owners of the bronze swords, but, as already mentioned in the Introductory Chapter, serious dispute has arisen whether the swords themselves are not Roman, or at all events of Roman date. The late Mr. Thomas Wright[1009] was the most ardent advocate of this latter view, and he has been to some extent supported by Mr. C. Roach Smith.[1010] The contrary view, that the swords belong to a Bronze Age before the use of that metal was superseded by that of iron, has been ably advocated by the late Mr. A. Henry Rhind, F.S.A.Scot.,[1011] and Sir John Lubbock.[1012] It seems almost needless for me here to enter further into this controversy, in which, to my mind, as already stated in the Introductory Chapter, the whole weight of the argument is in favour of a pre-Roman origin for these swords in Western and Northern Europe. There was no doubt a time when bronze swords were in use in Greece and Italy, and the substitution of iron or steel for bronze, so far as we can judge from the early iron swords found in the ancient cemetery at Hallstatt and elsewhere, involved little if any alteration in the form and character of the weapon, which was better adapted for thrusting than for striking. Even here in Britain, by the time when the Roman invasion took place, not only were swords made of iron in use, but the form of what is known as the Late-Celtic[1013] sword was no longer leaf-shaped, but slightly tapering, with the edges nearly straight almost as far as the point. Among the Romans it would seem that more than one change was made in the form of their swords after the introduction of iron as the material from which they were formed. As Mr. Rhind has pointed out, Polybius speaks of the swords wielded by the soldiers of Æmilius at the battle of Telamon, B.C. 225, as made not only to thrust but to give a falling stroke with singular effect. “During the Second Punic War, however, which immediately succeeded the battle of Telamon, the Romans adopted the Spanish sword,” the material of which we have no difficulty in definitely ascertaining, as “Diodorus Siculus[1014] particularly mentions the process by which the Celtiberians prepared their iron for the purpose of manufacturing swords so tempered that neither shield, helmet, nor bone could resist them.” How far their process of burying iron underground until a part of it had rusted away would, in the case of charcoal iron, leave the remaining portion more of the nature of steel, I am unable to say. Perhaps the amount of manipulation in charcoal necessary to restore the rusted plates to a serviceable condition may have produced this effect of converting the iron into mild steel. The steel of the sabres made in Japan,[1015] which will cut through an iron nail without their edge being injured, is said to be prepared in a similar manner from iron long buried underground.

Most of the bronze swords are shorter than those of the present day; but the Roman sword would, in the time of Julius, appear to have been longer than ours. Otherwise Cicero’s joke about his son-in-law, Lentulus, would have but little point, however small in person he may have been. Indeed, Macrobius[1016] expressly says that it was a long sword that Lentulus was wearing when Cicero made the inquiry, Who has tied my son-in-law to a sword?

The swords in use among the Britons at a somewhat later period appear to have been of great size, for Tacitus speaks of them as “ingentes” and “enormes.” They were also bluntly pointed, or “sine mucrone.” Such a description is entirely inconsistent with the form and size of our bronze swords, though it might well refer to some of the iron blades of the Late-Celtic Period, which are 3 feet in length. Others are, however, shorter.

Of the comparative rarity of bronze swords in Italy, and of their abundance in Scandinavia and Ireland, countries never occupied by the Romans, Sir John Lubbock[1017] has already spoken; and he has also summarized the reasons which convince him, as they do me, that our bronze weapons cannot be referred to Roman times. I will only repeat one of the arguments, of which perhaps not sufficient use has been made. It is that at the time when Julius Cæsar was invading Britain, and its inhabitants were thus for the first time brought in contact with Roman weapons, iron had been so long in use for swords in Italy that the term for the weapon was “ferrum.”

Another feature in bronze swords, which has been frequently commented on by archæological writers, is the comparatively small size of the hilt. “The handles are always very small, a fact which tends to prove that the men who used these swords were but of moderate stature.”[1018] “The handles of the bronze swords are very short and could not have been held comfortably by hands as large as ours—a characteristic much relied on by those who attribute the introduction of bronze into Europe to a people of Asiatic origin.[1019]

I must confess that I regard this view of the smallness of the hilts as being somewhat exaggerated. My own hand is none of the smallest, and yet where the bronze hilts of the Danish and Hungarian swords have been preserved I have no difficulty in finding room to clasp them. The part of the hilt where it expands to embrace the base of the blade was, I think, probably intended to be within the grasp of the hand, and not to be beyond it as a guard. In the case of some of the short dagger-like weapons it seems possible that the projecting rim, which forms a kind of pommel at the end of the hilt, was intended to rest between the fourth and the little finger, and thus to assist in its being grasped firmly when in use as a stabbing weapon. When the plates of horn or wood, which, as we shall subsequently see, once covered the hilt portion of the sword, have perished, it is hard to realise what was the exact form of the hilt; but it is quite evident that we must not assume that because the bare bronze does not fill the hand so as to give it a good grip, the same was the case when it had a plate of some other material on each face, which also possibly projected beyond the sides.

There is, moreover, one peculiarity about the hilt-plates of these swords which I have often pointed out by word of mouth, but which I think has not as yet been noticed in print. It is that there is generally, though not universally, a proportion between the length of the blade and the length of the hilt-plate; long sword blades having as a rule long hilt-plates, and short sword blades short hilt-plates. So closely is this kind of proportion preserved, that the outline of a large sword on the scale of one-sixth would in some cases almost absolutely correspond with that of one which was two-thirds of its length, if drawn on the scale of one-fourth.

This relative proportion between the length and size of a blade and its handle is by no means restricted to the swords of the Bronze Period, but prevails also among various tools, such as the saws and chisels of the present day. If, for instance, we were to argue from the saw-handles in a carpenter’s shop as to the size of the hands of the carpenters, we should soon find ourselves in difficulties. The handle of an ordinary hand-saw is sufficiently large to admit the hand of any one short of a giant, while the orifice in the handle of a small keyhole-saw will not admit more than a couple of fingers, and the handles of saws of intermediate size range between these two extremes. This fact suffices to inculcate caution in arguing from the hilt-plates of the bronze swords as to the size of the hands of those who used them. It is a question which will be more safely determined on osteological than archæological evidence; but, owing to the remarkable absence of bronze swords from the interments in our barrows, it may be some time before a sword and the bones of the hand that wielded it are found in juxtaposition.

Professor Rolleston[1020] has well said, “I am not quite clear that this bronze sword, leaf-shaped or other, has always a very small hilt.” “At any rate, there can be no doubt that in this country the skeletons of the Bronze Period belonged to much larger and stronger and taller men than did the skeletons of the Long Barrow stone-using folk who preceded them. In some parts of England the contrast in this matter of size between the men of the Bronze and those of the Stone Age is as great as that now existing between the Maori and the gentle Hindoo.”

The stature of several of the men interred in the Yorkshire barrows, examined by Canon Greenwell, was not less than five feet nine inches, and the bones of the hands were proportional to those of the bodies; but, unfortunately, no bronze swords accompanied them, though many of the interments were of the Bronze Age.

The usual form of sword to which the term “leaf-shaped” has been applied is that shown in Fig. 342. Their total length is generally about 24 inches, though sometimes not more than 16 inches, but they are occasionally as long as 30 inches, or even more. The blades are in most cases uniformly rounded, but with the part next the edge slightly drawn down so as to form a shallow fluting. In some instances, however, there is a more or less bold rounded central rib, or else projecting ridges running along the greater part of the blade near the edges. They differ considerably in the form of the plate for the hilt, and in the number and arrangement of the rivets by which the covering material was attached. This latter, as will subsequently be seen, usually consisted of plates of horn, bone, or wood, riveted on each side of the hilt-plate. In rare instances the outer part of the hilt was of bronze. Of the scabbards of such swords and the chapes attached to them I shall subsequently speak.

The sword shown in Fig. 342 was found about the year 1864 in the Thames, near Battersea Bridge, and is now in my own collection. Its length is 25¼ inches, and the blade is 2⅛ inches broad in its broadest part, though at the top of the hilt it is 2⅜ inches in breadth. Just above this point the edge of the blade has been removed so as to form two broad notches, the object being probably to save the hand of the warrior from being cut should the sword be drawn back in his hand, there being apparently no transverse guard. The hilt has been attached by rivets or pins passing through three longitudinal slots, which have been produced in the casting, and not subsequently drilled or made. The hilt-plate expands into a kind of fish-tail termination, which was probably enclosed in a pommel-like end formed by the plates of horn, or other material, of which the hilt was made. I have another sword, about 21 inches in length, which was found in the year 1851 near the circular encampment at Hawridge, on the south-eastern border of Buckinghamshire. The hilt-plate is of the same character as that of Fig. 342, but the lower slot is longer and the upper ones shorter. In the latter were found the bronze rivets for fastening on the hilt. This blade is figured on a small scale in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries.[1021]

Another sword (22 inches) of the same character, with three pointed oval slots for the rivets, was found at Washingborough,[1022] Lincolnshire. Two other leaf-shaped swords were found near the same spot. Another (24 inches), found near Midsummer Norton,[1023] Somerset, has the central slot nearly rectangular.

The central slot is sometimes accompanied by two or more rivet-holes in the projecting wings of the hilt-plate. A sword (24 inches) with two rivets was found between Woodlands and Gussage St. Michael,[1024] Dorset. Another, broken, was found, with fragments of others, socketed celts, spear-heads, a sickle, and other objects, near the Pierre du Villain, Alderney.[1025]

One (24½ inches) from the Thames,[1026] at Battersea, and now in the Bateman Collection, has a long rectangular slot and four rivets. One of two (24 inches), found in broken condition, with a spear-head and two ferrules, on Fulbourn Common,[1027] near Cambridge, was of this type. Another, from Aldreth, Cambs. (23½ inches), is in the Museum of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society.

I have an example, originally 26 inches long, found with a leaf-shaped spear-head near Weymouth.

The type occurs also in France. I have one (18¾ inches), with a slot and four rivets, from Albert, near Amiens. Another was found near Argenteuil,[1028] Seine et Oise. I have seen a bronze sword from Spain, also with the three slots.

In the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S., is a remarkably fine sword (27½ inches) from Barrow, Suffolk, in which the long slot in the hilt-plate is combined with ten small rivet-holes. The central ridge on the blade is well pronounced, as will be seen by Fig. 343. The blunted part of the blade near the hilt is engraved or milled diagonally. The number of rivets is here larger than usual; but in a sword (28½ inches) from the Thames, near Vauxhall,[1029] there are five rivet-holes in the centre of the plate in lieu of the slot, and four in each of the wings—thirteen in all. In another (23½ inches) from the same locality there are eleven, three in each wing and five in the centre. One (27 inches) from the Thames, in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries, has ten rivets, of which four are in the centre.

Another (28½ inches) with ten rivet-holes, four in the hilt-plate and three in each wing, was found in the Thames[1030] in 1856, and is in the British Museum.

A sword from the Roach Smith Collection (20⅜ inches) has a well-marked midrib to the blade, which is somewhat hollowed on either side of it. The hilt-plate has the central slot and four rivet-holes, in which two rivets remain.

In the British Museum is another sword (27⅝ inches) of much the same form at the hilt, but with ten rivet-holes, three in each wing and four in the central plate, which is prolonged beyond the fishtail-like expansion in the form of a flat tang, 1 inch by ⅝ inch. It was found in the Lea,[1031] near London. The lower part of the hilt has been united to the blade by a subsequent process of burning on, as will shortly be mentioned.

This prolongation of the hilt-plate is not singular. In the Rouen Museum is a sword with thirteen rivets which exhibits this peculiarity. The same exists in a Swiss Lake[1032] sword, and is not uncommon in swords found in Italy.

Another sword from the Thames (23 inches) has five holes in the hilt-plate and four in each wing. The blade, which expands from 1¼ inch near the hilt to 2⅛ inches at two-thirds of its length, is ornamented with a single engraved line skirting the edge.

In the British Museum is another remarkably fine sword from the Thames, ornamented in a similar manner, but with a slot in the hilt-plate and three rivet-holes in each wing. The blade is 24½ inches long and from 1⅞ inch to 2⅜ inches wide.

Another, from Battle, Sussex (29½ inches), has eleven rivets, three in the hilt-plate, which is in form much like that of Fig. 343. The blade is drawn down towards the edges. The lower end shows where the runner was broken off after it was cast, and is left quite rough, thus raising the presumption that it was covered by some kind of pommel. Five rivets are still preserved.

A sword from the Medway, at Upnor Reach, is 31¼ inches long and 1⅞ inch wide at the broadest part. It has no less than fifteen rivet-holes for the hilt, in three groups of five each.

One from the Thames (28⅝ inches), with plain blade and thirteen rivet-holes, has five small rivets still in situ.

More commonly the rivet-holes are fewer in number. One (24½ inches) in Canon Greenwell’s Collection, from Broadway Tower, Broadway, Worcester, has nine rivet-holes, three in the tang and three in each wing. One from the Thames at Battersea[1033] (26 inches), and one from Ebberston, Yorkshire, in the Bateman Collection, have the rivets arranged in the same manner, as has one which was found near Whittingham,[1034] Northumberland, with another sword subsequently to be described, and also with three spear-heads.

I have one (19 inches) with eight rivet-holes, four in the centre and two in each wing, found near Cambridge. The holes appear to have been either made or enlarged by a punch having been driven through them, the rough burr being left on. On either side of the central ridge of the blade there is a pair of engraved lines parallel to the edges and at about ¼ inch distant from them. The base of the blade next the expansion for the hilt has been neatly serrated or engrailed, like that of the sword from Barrow, but in this case transversely. Unfortunately this blade, which is beautifully patinated, has been broken into three pieces.

French swords of this class, both with a central slot combined with rivets and with rivets only, are by no means uncommon. Specimens of each, from the department of Seine et Oise, are figured in the “Dictionnaire Archéologique de la Gaule.” One with a slot and four rivets is in the museum at Nantes. Two with seven rivet-holes were found at St. Nazaire-sur-Loire[1035] (Loire Inférieure).

Seven is, indeed, a more usual number for the rivet-holes than any of these higher numbers. In Fig. 344 is shown a fine example of a sword with seven rivet-holes, found in the Tyne, near Newcastle, and now in the collection of Canon Greenweil, F.R.S. It is 28 inches in length, and has a bead or rib just within the edges, which is somewhat exaggerated in the figure. The hilt-plate is provided with slight flanges for retaining the horn or wood that formed the hilt, and has a semicircular notch at the base, possibly for the reception of a rivet. See Fig. 356.

A sword from the Thames near Battersea (28⅝ inches), in the British Museum, is of nearly the same form as Fig. 344, but the end of the hilt-plate has no notch, and there is no midrib running down it. The hilt has been fastened by seven rivets, which fit tightly in the holes and are nearly all in position. Their ends have conical depressions in them, as if a punch had been used as a riveting tool. In some the rivets have been closed by a hollow punch, so as to leave a small stud projecting in the middle of each surrounded by a deep hollow ring. Some French swords present the same peculiarity.

A sword of the same form (23¾ inches), but with a plain blade and only five small rivet-holes, was found in the Medway at Chatham Reach, and is now in the same collection. The hilt seems to have been burnt on.

A sword of this form (25¼ inches), with raised ridges parallel to the edges, has a rounded end to the hilt-plate and holes for six very small pins or rivets at the base and for one large one. The hilt-plate has been much hammered. It was found in the Thames. A second (24¾ inches), almost identical in every respect, has retained five of its pins.

There are two swords in the Norwich Museum, each of them with seven rivet-holes, both 21½ inches long, but the one found at Woolpit, Suffolk, and the other at Windsor. One of the swords found at Fulbourn,[1036] Cambridge, had its rivets arranged as in Fig. 344. The blade is somewhat fluted between the central ridge and has smaller ridges running parallel to the edges. Another (23¾ inches), found in Glamorganshire,[1037] is of the same character. Another like this was found in the bed of the Lark,[1038] at Icklingham, Suffolk.

I have two swords (about 23 inches) with seven rivet-holes, which were found with spear-heads, a halberd, and other objects at Stoke Ferry, Norfolk. They are unfortunately broken. One of them appears to have been a defective casting, and to have wanted a portion of its hilt-plate. This has been subsequently supplied by a second hilt-plate having been cast over the broken end of the original plate, a hole in which has been stopped with a rivet, which has been partly covered over by the metal of the second casting. This is not an unique instance of mending by burning on additional metal. I have a small leaf-shaped sword (17⅜ inches), for which I am indebted to the Earl of Enniskillen, found near Thornhill, Killina, Co. Cavan, which has in old times had a new hilt-plate cast on the original blade in this manner.

Other swords with seven rivet-holes arranged as in Fig. 344 have been found near Alton Castle,[1039] Staffordshire, and at Billinghay,[1040] Lincoln.

A sword with six rivet-holes (23 inches) was found near Cranbourne,[1041] Dorset. Another of the same length was dug up at Stifford,[1042] near Gray’s Thurrock, Essex. Another (20½ inches) was found in the Severn[1043] at Buildwas, Salop. The rivet-holes are two in the middle and two in each wing.

A leaf-shaped sword, the hilt broken off, but the blade still 22½ inches long, was found with a bronze spear-head, a palstave, and a long pin, in the Thames,[1044] near the mouth of the Wandle. It is now in the British Museum.

A sword with the hilt-plate like that of Fig. 344 has been found in Rhenish Hesse.[1045]

Another variety of the sword has a strong central rounded rib along the blade, of which kind a good example is shown in Fig. 345. The original is in the collection of Mr. Robert Fitch, F.S.A., who has kindly lent it to me for engraving. It was found at Wetheringsett,[1046] Suffolk, and is said to have had remains of a wooden hilt and scabbard, attached to it when found. Human bones are also reported to have been found near it. It is 25½ inches long, with engraved lines on the hilt, and has only two rivet-holes besides the central square-ended slot.

Mr. Fisher, of Ely, has a sword of the same character (25 inches), but with four rivets and a slot, found in the Fens near Ely.

A fragment of what appears to have been a sword of the same character, but with two rivet-holes instead of the central slot, was found with socketed celts and spear-heads at Bilton,[1047] Yorkshire.

I have a fragment of a blade of this kind in the Reach Fen hoard. Another fragment, from Chrishall, Essex, is in the British Museum, as is also one found under Beachy Head.[1048] It has two rivet-holes in each wing, and three considerably larger in the centre. They appear to be cast, and not drilled. With this fragment were found palstaves, socketed celts, lumps of copper, and gold armlets.

The type also occurs in France. I have a specimen from the Seine at Paris, with the hilt and lower part almost identical with Fig. 345, but the blade does not expand in the same manner, and has two lines engraved on each side of the central rib, the inner pair meeting on the rib some little way from the point, the outer continued to nearly the end of the blade. I have fragments of a sword of similar character from the hoard found at Dreuil, near Amiens. The fragment from Beachy Head already mentioned may possibly be of Gaulish origin.

On an Italian oblong bronze coin or quincussis, 6⅝ inches by 3½ inches, and weighing about 3½ lbs., is the representation of a leaf-shaped sword with a raised rib along the centre of the blade, and in general character much like Fig. 345. A specimen of this coin is in the British Museum,[1049] and bears upon the reverse the figure of a scabbard with parallel sides, and a nearly circular chape. Another coin of the same type, engraved by Carelli,[1050] has a nearly similar scabbard on the reverse, but the sword on the obverse is either represented as being in its scabbard or is not at all leaf-shaped, the sides of the blade being parallel. The hilt is also curved, and there is a cross-guard. In fact, upon the one coin, the weapon has the appearance of a Roman sword of iron, and on the other that of a leaf-shaped sword of bronze. These pieces were no doubt cast in Umbria, probably in the third century B.C., but their attribution to Ariminum is at best doubtful. From the two varieties of sword appearing on coins of the same type, the inference may be drawn either that at the time when they were cast, bronze swords were in Umbria being superseded by those of iron; or that the type originally referred to some sacred weapon of bronze such as is represented on the coin in the British Museum, but was subsequently made more conventional so as to represent the sword in ordinary use at the period.

The sword with a central rib was sometimes attached to the hilt in a different manner from any of the blades hitherto described, as will be seen by Fig. 346, copied from the Archæological Association Journal.[1051] This sword was found at Tiverton, near Bath, and it is provided with four rivets, a pair on each side of the continuation of the central rib along the hilt-plate. Human remains and stag’s-horns are said to have been found near it.

In the British Museum is a blade of the same kind (19⅝ inches), with semicircular notches for the four rivets. It was found in the Thames at Kingston. Another from the Thames (21 inches) has the two upper holes perfect.

Leaf-shaped swords of the ordinary type also occasionally had their hilts attached in the same manner. Fig. 347 shows a blade from the Thames,[1052] near Kingston (16⅛ inches) with the rivet-holes thus arranged. I have another, from the Hugo Collection (18 inches), found in the Thames about a mile west from Barking Creek,[1053] which has had four rivet-holes arranged in the same manner, though the margins are now broken away, so that only traces of the holes remain. Another apparently of this type was found in Lincolnshire.[1054]

In Canon Greenwell’s Collection is a leaf-shaped blade of the same character (15¾ inches), which, however, has only two rivet-holes, one on each side of the hilt-plate. It was found at Sandford,[1055] near Oxford, together with a rapier-shaped blade.

Another variety has a narrower tang and rivet holes in the median line. A blade of this kind, which is in Mr. Layton’s Collection, was found in the Thames at Greenwich, and is engraved in the Archæological Journal.[1056]

Before proceeding to the consideration of the swords with more perfect hilts and pommels found in England, it will be well to give references to some of the other instances of leaf-shaped swords found in this country and in Wales. Several have been found in the Thames[1057] besides those already mentioned. Others have been discovered in the Isle of Portland;[1058] at Brixworth,[1059] Northamptonshire; and in the sea-dike bank between Fleet and Gedney,[1060] Lincolnshire. Two, one with the chape of the scabbard, of which more hereafter, were found at Ebberston,[1061] Yorkshire.

Two were found at Ewart Park,[1062] near Wooler, Northumberland, one of which is in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-on-Tyne.

Some fragments of swords, regarded as being of copper, were found, with spear-heads, celts, and lumps of metal, at Lanant,[1063] and also at St. Hilary, Cornwall, about the year 1802.

There were also some fragments in the Broadward find,[1064] Shropshire, which consisted principally of spear-heads and ferrules. Occasionally a considerable number of swords are said to have been found together. No less than twenty are reported to have been discovered about the year 1726 near Alnwick Castle,[1065] in company with forty-one socketed celts and sixteen spear-heads; and two broad swords, one sharp-pointed sword, a spear-point, and a socketed celt were found “in a bundle together” at Ambleside, Westmoreland,[1066] about 1741.

Two swords, some spear-heads, celts, and other relics were discovered at Shenstone,[1067] Staffordshire, in 1824. Near them are said to have been some fragments of human bones. Some swords are reported to have been found in a marsh on the Wrekin Tenement,[1068] Shropshire, with a celt and about one hundred and fifty fragments of spear-heads.

Two swords and a fragment of a third were found in the Heathery Burn Cave, in company with numerous bronze and bone instruments and a gold armlet and penannular hollow bead. Most of these objects are now in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S. Three swords were found at Branton, Northumberland, and are now in the Alnwick Museum; where are also two which had pommels of lead, and were found with two rings near Tosson, parish of Rothbury, in that county. Another, which was also accompanied by two rings, were found near Medomsley, Durham. These rings may in some manner have served to attach the swords to a belt.

Most of the swords found in Wales appear to be in a fragmentary condition. Engravings of some leaf-shaped swords are said to exist on a rock between Barmouth[1069] and Dolgellau, North Wales.

A fragment of a sword was found, with a bronze sheath-end, looped palstaves, spear-heads, and a ferrule, near Guilsfield,[1070] Montgomeryshire. Fragments of three swords were found, with lance-heads, ferrules, a chape, and other objects, at Glancych,[1071] Cardiganshire. They appear to have had six rivets.

English swords, with the hilts, or pommels, or both, formed of bronze, are not of common occurrence. The first which I have selected for illustration has the side edges so straight that it hardly belongs to the class usually known as leaf-shaped. The hilt-plate is peculiar in having well-developed side flanges which expand at the base so as to form an oval pommel. The hilt has as usual been formed of two plates of bone or wood, which have been secured to the hilt-plate by six rivets. This sword, which was found in the Fens, near Ely, has unfortunately lost its point, but is still 19¼ inches long. It was lent me for engraving (as Fig. 348) by Mr. M. Fisher, of Ely. In some Danish examples the high flanges of the hilt-plates are covered by thin plates of gold, beyond which, of course, the hilt of bone, wood, or horn did not project, and no doubt in this instance also the side flanges were left visible and not in any way covered. They are upwards of 4 inches in length, so that the hilt would fit into a large hand.

A small but very interesting sword with a perfect bronze hilt and pommel is shown in Fig. 349. It was found in the River Cherwell,[1072] and is now in the Museum at Oxford. It was kindly lent me by Professor Rolleston for the purpose of engraving. The total length of the weapon is 21 inches, of which the pommel and hilt, which is adapted for a decidedly large hand, occupy about 5 inches. The hilt has the appearance of having been cast upon the blade, and seems to be formed of bronze of the same character. There are no rivets visible by which the two castings are attached the one to the other.

I am of opinion that the same process of attaching the hilt to the blade by casting the one upon the other was in use in Scandinavia and Germany. Some of the bronze daggers from Italy seem also to have had their hilts cast upon the blades in which the rivets were already fixed.

In the British Museum is a sword blade with slight ribs inside the edges, retaining a portion of the hilt, which is cast in a separate piece and attached to the wings by two rivets. It is said to have been found in the Thames.[1073] The hilt has had ribs round it at intervals of about half an inch apart.

On a fragment of a sword blade, ornamented on each side with five parallel engraved lines, the upper margin of the hilt is marked out by a raised and engrailed line of the same form as the upper end of the hilt of Fig. 350. It was found in the Fen, near Wicken, Cambs, with a part of a scabbard end, spear-heads, and other objects now in the British Museum.

A remarkably fine sword, found in the River Witham,[1074] below Lincoln, in 1826, is shown in Fig. 350, for the use of which I am indebted to the Council of the Society of Antiquaries. The original is in the museum of the Duke of Northumberland, at Alnwick. It presents the peculiarity of having two spirals attached to the base of the hilt with a projecting pin between them, the whole taking the place of the pommel. The blade appears to be engraved with parallel lines on either side of the midrib. These spirals are of far more common occurrence on the Continent than in Britain, and this sword, though found so far north as Lincoln, is not improbably of foreign origin.

Several such have been found in France. One with the spirals but a different form of hilt was found at Aliès, Cantal.[1075]

A bronze sword found in the Rhône at Lyons, but now in the museum at Rennes,[1076] Brittany, has a nearly similar hilt and pommel It has three raised bands on the hilt, but no pin between the spirals. Some of the swords from the Swiss Lake-dwellings have similar hilts. They have been found at Concise,[1077] in the Lake of Neuchâtel, and in the Lac de Luissel.[1078]

Another of the same kind is in the Johanneum at Gratz, Styria. The same form was also found at Hallstatt.[1079] Another was found near Stettin.[1080] Another from Erxleben,[1081] Magdeburg, is in the Brunswick Museum.

The hilt of a sword with spirals and a central pin was found in the great Bologna hoard. A perfect example is in the Royal Armoury at Turin.[1082]

There are several swords with this kind of hilt in the Museum of Northern Antiquities at Copenhagen,[1083] some of which are figured by Madsen.[1084] The spirals are sometimes found detached. A highly interesting paper by Dr. Oscar Montelius on the different forms of hilts of bronze swords and daggers is published in the Stockholm volume of the Congress for Prehistoric Archæology.[1085]

The remarkable sword with a somewhat analogous termination to the hilt, shown in Fig. 351, was found at Thrunton Farm,[1086] in the parish of Whittingham, Northumberland, and is in the collection of Lord Ravensworth. With it was found another sword already mentioned, a spear-head with lunate openings in the blade (Fig. 418), and some smaller leaf-shaped spear-heads. They are said to have been all found sticking in a moss with the points downwards, and arranged in a circle. The pommel end of the hilt is in this instance a distinct casting, and is very remarkable on account of the two curved horns extending from it, which are somewhat trumpet-mouthed, with a projecting cone in the centre of each.

In Scotland a number of bronze swords have been found which bear, as might have been anticipated, a close resemblance to those from England.

That shown in Fig. 352 was found in a moss at Leuchland, Brechin, in Angus, and is now in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S. Its length is 26½ inches, and the six rivets for attaching the hilt are still in the hilt-plate, which is doubly hooked at the end. A rib from the thicker part of the blade is prolonged part of the way down the hilt-plate as in Fig. 344. Another sword, broken at the hilt, but still 26¼ inches long, was found on the same farm. A find from Brechin is mentioned further on. A sword with four rivet-holes, like those from Arthur’s Seat, found on the borders between England and Scotland, and engraved by Grose,[1087] has the same peculiar end to the hilt-plate, as has one with five rivets from Methlick, Aberdeenshire, now in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. Grose has also engraved two, each with six rivet-holes in the wings and two or three in the hilt-plate, found in Duddingston Loch,[1088] near Edinburgh, as well as the hilt-plate of another, found near Peebles, with slots in the wings and a slot and rivet-hole in the tang.

Some fragments of swords from this loch are in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. Almost directly above Duddingston Loch, on Arthur’s Seat,[1089] two other swords were found during the construction of the Queen’s Drive. They are 26¼ inches and 24¼ inches long, in outline like Fig. 342, with one rivet-hole in each wing and two in the centre of the hilt-plate.

Two (23⅜ inches and 20½ inches) of the usual character, with nine rivets and hilts much like Fig. 354, have been found in Lanarkshire.[1090]

In Gordon’s “Itinerarium Septentrionale”[1091] a sword (24½ inches) found near Irvine, Argyleshire, is engraved, as is also one (26 inches) found in Graham’s Dyke near Carinn, which is said to be in the Advocates’ Library at Edinburgh. The figures do not seem accurate, but show seven rivets in one and three in the other. Gordon makes no doubt that these swords are Roman.

Other specimens have been found at Forse,[1092] Latheron, Caithness (25 inches), near the Point of Sleat,[1093] Isle of Skye (22½ inches), with two spear-heads and a pin. Another was found in Wigtonshire.[1094]

In the Antiquarian Museum are specimens from the following counties: Aberdeen, Argyle, Ayr, Edinburgh, Fife, Forfar, Kincardine, and Stirling.

In peat, at Iochdar,[1095] South Uist, were found two swords like that from Arthur’s Seat, the hilts of which are said to have been formed of wood. A leather sheath is also reported to have been present.

A bronze scabbard tip, such as will subsequently be described, was found, with four bronze swords (about 24 inches) and a large spear-head, near Brechin,[1096] Forfarshire; and in Corsbie Moss,[1097] Legerwood, Berwick, a bronze sword and spear-head were found, the former having, it is said, a scabbard, apparently of metal, but so much corroded as to fall in pieces on removal. This also may have been of leather stained by the metal.

A sword with a large pommel (24 inches), closely resembling Fig. 353, was found, together with two other sword blades (one 25 inches with slots), a scabbard end, and two bronze pins, with large circular flat heads, at Tarves,[1098] Aberdeenshire. Some of these were presented to the British Museum by the Earl of Aberdeen. There is a recess on the hilt-plate for the reception of the horn or bone of the hilt, which was fastened by three rivets still remaining.

Another sword, the blade 22 inches long, the handle, including a round hollow pommel, 5½ inches, was found in Skye, and is engraved in “Pennant’s Tour.”[1099] It shows four rivet-holes arranged like those in the sword from Arthur’s Seat, so that the hilt was probably formed as usual of horn or wood and not of bronze.

A few other swords with pommels to their hilts have been found in Scotland. That shown in Fig. 353 was found in Edinburgh,[1100] with, it is said, thirteen or fourteen more, a pin, and ring, and a kind of annular button, of bronze. It is now in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. The hilt appears to have been added to the hilt-plate by a subsequent process of casting. The pommel has been cast over a core of clay, which it still retains within it. Another of the swords (24¼ inches) has the hilt-plate pierced for six rivets. Two others which have been examined are imperfect.

Mr. Joseph Anderson, who has described this find, points out that this hilt must have “been cast in a matrix modelled from a sword which had the grip made up of two convex plates attached on either side of the handle plate, and their ends covered by a hollow pommel”—in fact, from such a sword as that from Tarves, already mentioned. He also observes that the holes in the hilt are not rivet-holes, and thinks that they may have been caused by wooden pins used to hold the clay core in position, for the handle as well as the pommel is hollow. I am rather doubtful as to the accuracy of this theory, as such pins would, I think, produce blow-holes in the metal in casting. There may, however, have been clay projections from the inner core which would leave holes such as these, into which studs of wood, bone, or horn might afterwards be inserted by way of ornament and to add firmness to the grip. For details of the finding of from thirty to forty bronze swords in Scotland, the reader is referred to Mr. Anderson’s paper.

The bronze leaf-shaped swords from Ireland, of which nearly or quite a hundred, either perfect or fragmentary, are preserved in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, have been treated of at some length by the late Sir William Wilde,[1101] whose Catalogue the reader may consult with advantage. Ingeneral appearance they closely resemble the swords from the sister countries, and vary in length from about eighteen to thirty inches. The blades are usually rounded on the faces, or have a faintly marked median ridge, and are slightly fluted along the edges. This fluting or bevelling is sometimes bounded by a raised ridge. The form with a rounded rib along the middle of the blade is almost unknown. There is considerable variation in the form of the end of the hilt-plate, in which occasionally there is a deep V-shaped notch, or several smaller notches. The most common termination is that like a fish-tail as seen in Fig. 354. The number of rivet-holes is various, ranging from four to eleven. There are occasionally slots[1102] in the hilt-plate and in the wings at the base of the blade.

They have been found in most parts of the kingdom.

A common type of Irish sword is shown in Fig. 354 from a specimen found at Newtown Limavady, Co. Derry, in 1870. One wing of the fish-tail termination is wanting and has been restored in the sketch. The nine rivet-holes seem to have been cast and not drilled, though they may have been slightly counter-sunk subsequently to the casting. The hilt-plate is slightly fluted, perhaps with the view of steadying the hilt.

In a fragment of a sword found with spear-heads, a socketed dagger, and a fragment of a hammer on Bo Island, Enniskillen, there are five deep flutings on each side of the hilt-plate. As is the case with some of the English examples already mentioned, this hilt-plate has been joined to the blade by some process of burning on. One of the four rivet-holes in it has been partially closed by the operation. Sir William Wilde has noticed that several of the leaf-shaped swords under his charge had been broken and subsequently “welded” both by fusion and by the addition of a collar of the metal which encircles the extremities of the fragments. The term “welding” is, however, inappropriate to a metal of the character of bronze.

In the British Museum is a sword of this type with nine rivet-holes (25¼ inches), found near Aghadoe,[1103] Co. Kerry.

In the small Irish blade of much the same type (Fig. 355) there are only three rivet-holes, which have been cast in the blade, a fourth having from some cause been filled up with the metal, though a depression on each face marks the spot where the hole was intended to be.

There were several swords, mostly broken, in the great Dowris hoard. They had a rivet-hole in each wing and two or three in the hilt-plate.

Some of the bronze swords found in Ireland attracted the attention of antiquaries upwards of a century ago. Governor Pownall described two found in a bog at Cullen, Tipperary, which are engraved in the Archæologia.[1104] They are 26½ inches and 27 inches long, and one of them is of the same form as the Scotch sword, Fig. 352. Vallancey[1105] has also figured one (22 inches) with eight rivets.

From among those in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy I have selected two for engraving. The first, Fig. 356 (26¼ inches), has had its hilt attached by a number of very small pins instead of rivets of the usual size. The second, Fig. 357, is a short blade about 19½ inches long, with a central rib extending down the hilt-plate, in which there are four rivet-holes, two on each side.

A bronze sword from Polignac, Haute Loire, now in the Museum at Le Puy, Haute Loire, has its hilt-plate like that of Fig. 356, but has only four rivets. Another with seven rivets was found in a dolmen at Miers,[1106] Lot. Another with six rivets from the Department of Jura[1107] is in the museum at St. Germain.

Another from near Besançon,[1108] Doubs, has six small rivets. One found at Alise Ste. Reine,[1109] Côte d’Or, has four rivets only.

The type also occurred at Hallstatt,[1110] and in Germany.[1111]

At least two swords have been found in Ireland still retaining the plates of bone which formed their hilts. By the kindness of Mr. Robert Day, F.S.A., I am able to reproduce full-sized figures of both sides of one of the most perfect specimens, as Figs. 358 and 359, which have already appeared in the Journal of the Royal Historical and Archæological Association of Ireland.[1112]

The sword itself, shown on a small scale in Fig. 360, was found in Lisletrim Bog, Muckno, Co. Monaghan. It is 24½ inches long, with a thick midrib running along the blade. The plates of bone which are still attached have been pronounced by Professor Owen to be mammalian, and probably cetacean. It will be observed that at the wings of the hilt-plate the bone projects somewhat beyond the metal. The same peculiarity may be observed in the bone hilt of a sword found at Mullylagan,[1113] Co. Armagh, which has somewhat the appearance of having been carved at the end next the blade into a pair of rude volutes. It is shown full-size in Fig. 361. The sword itself, on a small scale, is shown in Fig. 362. In this instance the bone projects beyond the sides of the hilt-plate. I have not seen the specimen, which is preserved in the collection of Mr. A. Knight Young, of Monaghan.[1114] A bronze sword with six rivets, found near Kallundborg, Denmark,[1115] had the hilt formed of wood.

As is the case with several of the bronze swords discovered in Scandinavia, some of those found in Ireland seem to have been decorated with gold upon their hilts.

On one of the rivets of a sword found in a bog near Cullen,[1116] Tipperary, was a thin piece of gold weighing upwards of 12 dwts. Another sword,[1117] found near the same place in 1751, had a plate of gold on one side which covered the hilt; at the end was a small object like a pommel of a sword, with three links of a chain hanging from it. The whole weighed 3 ozs. 3 dwts. 11 grs. In this bog about twenty bronze swords were found at intervals, besides about forty pieces of hilt-plates in which the rivets stood. In one sword[1118] there was a recess near the blade, ½ × ¼ × 1/6 inch, in which was “a piece of pewter which just fitted it, with four channels cut in it, in each of which was laid a thin bit of fine copper, so that they resembled four figures of 1.”

A fragment of a blade which Wilde[1119] considers to be that of a sword, is decorated with raised lines and circles in relief, which were cast with the blade. A portion of it is shown in Fig. 363. As the whole fragment is only 4¼ inches long, it may have formed part of a socketed knife or some other instrument, and not of a sword. A part of a spear-head, with a series of ring ornaments engraved on the blade, was in the hoard found at Haynes Hill, Kent.[1120]

There is considerable general resemblance between the bronze swords found in the British Islands and those of the continental countries of Europe. The similarities with those from France have already been pointed out. Several with ornamented hilts have been figured by Chantre[1121] and others. One has a hemispherical pommel and a varied design on the hilt.

The bronze swords from the Swiss Lake-dwellings[1122] have frequently bronze hilts, like those of the swords from the South of France. In some instances the hilt-plate has side flanges, with a central slot or line of rivets, and rivets in the wings. In others the broad tang forming the hilt has two or three rivet-holes. In some hilts cast in bronze there is a recess for receiving a piece of horn or wood. The blades have frequently delicate raised ribs, sometimes six on each face, running along them.

The bronze swords of Italy[1123] present several varieties not found in Britain. The sides of the blades are more nearly parallel, and many have a slender tang at the hilt, sometimes with two rivet-holes forming loops at the side of the tang, sometimes with one rivet-hole in its centre. In some the blade narrows somewhat for the tang, in each side of which are two semicircular notches for the rivets. In some Italian and French swords the blade is drawn out to a long tapering point, so that its edges present a somewhat ogival curve.

A fragment of a very remarkable Greek sword from Thera[1124] has a series of small broad-edged axes of gold, in shape like conventional battle-axes, inlaid along the middle of the blade between two slightly projecting ribs.

The double-edged bronze swords found by Dr. Schliemann[1125] at Mycenæ are tanged and often provided with pommels made of alabaster. The hilts and scabbards are in some cases decorated with gold. The blades are usually long and narrow, though some widen considerably at the hilt-end, so as to form a broad shoulder to the tang. Swords appear to have been much rarer on the presumed site of Troy.

There appear to be doubts whether the beautiful bronze sword in the Berlin Museum,[1126] reported to have been found at Pella, in Macedonia, does not belong to the valley of the Rhine.

Bronze swords have but rarely been found in Egypt. In my own collection, however, is one which was found at Great Kantara during the construction of the Suez Canal. The blade, about 17 inches long, is leaf-shaped, and much like that of Fig. 360, but more uniform in width. Instead of having a hilt-plate it is drawn down to a small tang about 3/16 inch square. This again expands into an octagonal bar, about ⅜ inch in diameter, which has been drawn down to a point, and then turned back to form a hook, probably for suspending the sword at the belt. At the base of the blade are two rivet-holes. The hilt must have been formed of two pieces which clasped the tang. The total length of the sword from the point to the top of the hook is 22⅜ inches. I have never seen another similar example, but a bronze sword blade, presumably from Lower Egypt, is in the museum at Berlin. It has an engraved line down each side of the blade, and its sides are more parallel than in mine from Kantara, already mentioned. The hilt is broken off. A German sword from the Magdeburg district, with a tang and two rivet-holes at the base of the blade, closely resembles mine from Egypt, except that it has no hook to the tang.

The bronze swords found in Denmark[1127] and Northern Germany[1128] have often side flanges to the hilt-plate, like Fig. 348, occasionally plated with gold; but the blades are generally more uniform in width, and have the edges straighter than those from the United Kingdom. Some blades have a simple tang. On a very large proportion the hilt formed of bronze (or of some more perishable material alternating with bronze plates) has been preserved. The pommels are usually formed of oval or rhomboidal plates with a central boss, and are generally ornamented below.

Some of the swords found in Sweden and Denmark have been regarded by Dr. Montelius[1129] and Mr. Worsaae[1130] as of foreign origin.

A bronze sword from Finland with a flanged hilt-plate and eight rivet-holes has been[1131] figured.

In Germany[1132] the bronze swords present types which more nearly resemble those of France and Denmark than those of the British Isles. Those with a flanged hilt-plate are found, however, both in Northern and Southern Germany, as well as in Italy, Austria and Hungary. Others have long and narrow tangs, but a large proportion are provided with bronze hilts, usually with disc-like pommels. These hilts conceal the form of the tangs. Some few have spirals at the end of the hilt, as already mentioned, and one from Brandenburg, in the Berlin Museum, has a spheroidal pommel. In some of the bronze hilts there are recesses for the reception of pieces of horn or wood, as on some of the French and Swiss swords.

Iron swords of the same general character as those of bronze have been found in the ancient cemetery at Hallstatt and elsewhere. Those from Hallstatt[1133] are identical in character with the bronze swords from the same locality. In one instance the hilt and pommel of an iron sword are in bronze; in another the pommel alone; the hilt-plate of iron being flat, and provided with rivets exactly like those of the bronze swords. In others the pommel is wanting. I have a broken iron sword from this cemetery, with the hilt-plate perfect, and having three bronze rivets still in it, and the holes for two others at the pommel end. The blade has a central rounded rib along it like Fig. 345, but with a small bead on either side. I have a beautiful bronze sword from the same locality, on the blade of which are two small raised beads on either side of the central rib, and in the spaces between them a threefold wavy line punched in or engraved. In this instance a tang has passed through the hilt, that was formed of alternate blocks of bronze and of some substance that has now perished, possibly ivory. A magnificent iron sword from Hallstatt, now in the Vienna Museum, has the hilt and pommel formed of ivory inlaid with amber.

The late Celtic iron swords found in Britain have been described by Mr. A. W. Franks, F.R.S., in an exhaustive paper in the Archæologia,[1134] in which also the reader will find many interesting particulars of analogous swords found in continental countries.

Several iron swords have been found in France with flat hilt-plates and rivets exactly of the same character as those of the bronze swords. Nine have been discovered in tumuli at Cosne, Magny Lambert, and elsewhere in the department of Côte d’Or. Others have been found at Cormoz, Ain; and at Gédinne, in Belgium. There can be but little doubt that M. Alexandre Bertrand[1135] is right in assigning the French examples to the fourth or fifth century B.C., and in regarding them as direct descendants from the bronze swords of ordinary type. He adduces, also, the remarkable fragment of an iron sword with a bronze hilt found in the Lac de Bienne, which is in exact imitation of a bronze sword with ribs on the blade, as an additional proof that these early iron swords are the reproductions, pure and simple, of those in bronze, and fabricated from the metal then recently introduced into the West. How far back in time the use of bronze swords in Gaul may have extended it is difficult to say, but the varieties in their types testify to a lengthened use before they began to be superseded by those of iron.

I must, however, now describe the sheaths by which these blades were protected.

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XIII. SCABBARDS AND CHAPES

ALTHOUGH the sheaths which protected the daggers and swords described in the preceding chapters consisted probably for the most part of wood or leather, yet in many instances some portion of the scabbard and its fittings was made of bronze; and to the description of these objects it seems desirable to devote a separate chapter. It is rarely that the metallic portions of the sheaths have been found in company with the blades; but in one instance at least a portion of a sword blade has been discovered within a surrounding sheath of bronze; which, however, does not extend the full length of the blade, the upper part of the scabbard having probably been formed of wood. This discovery proves that the short bronze sheaths, which are usually from 8 to 12 inches long, belonged to swords, and not, as at first sight might be inferred from their size, to daggers.

In France some much longer bronze sheaths have been found with the swords still in them. The most noteworthy is that from the neighbourhood of Uzés,[1136] Gard, now in the Musée d’Artillerie, at Paris, which is decorated with transverse beaded lines alternating with ornaments of concentric rings. This scabbard is longer by some inches than the blade it contains. In fact, in no instance does the point of the sword appear to have reached so far as the end of the sheath. Another sheath found at Cormoz (Ain)[1137] is in the museum at Lyons.

In a few instances the wooden sheaths of bronze swords have been found entire. The finest is that from the Kongshöi,[1138] Vamdrup, Ribe, Denmark. It was found with a body in a tree-coffin of oak. This sheath is about a fifth longer than the blade of the sword, and is carved on both faces, though more highly decorated on what must have been the outer face, than on the inner. There is no metal mounting at either end. Another scabbard found in the Treenhöi[1139] is likewise of wood. Its chape also is formed of some hard wood. It has been lined with skin, the hair towards the blade of the sword. This sheath is about an eighth longer than the blade of the sword.

No doubt many of the British sheaths were made of wood alone. Others, though partly made of that material, were tipped with bronze, the metal being secured to the wood, or the leather, if that material was used, by a small rivet which passed diagonally through the metal. As Mr. Franks[1140] has pointed out, the presence of this rivet-hole would have been sufficient to show that these objects are not dagger sheaths, as some have thought, for the rivet leaves too small a part of the bronze receptacle available for a blade even as long as that of an ordinary dagger. The discovery already mentioned places this question beyond doubt.

The bronze sheaths of the iron swords and daggers of the Late Celtic Period are of a different character from those I am about to describe, and are made of sheet bronze, and not cast in a single piece.

In Fig. 364 is shown a portion of a sword blade, with the scabbard end still in position, which was found in the Thames near Isleworth, and is in the collection of Mr. T. Layton, F.S.A.[1141] This scabbard end has a central rib and two other slight ribs along each margin in order to give it strength, and, as will be seen from the figure, probably extends at least 6 inches beyond the end of the sword, thus giving an opportunity of securing the metal end to the wooden or leather scabbard at a place where the blade would not interfere with the passage of a pin or rivet.

A scabbard end of much the same form (13½ inches) is shown in Fig. 365. It was found with fifteen others, some broken, near Guilsfield,[1142] Montgomeryshire, together with looped palstaves, spear-heads, &c. It has a small rivet-hole about half-way along it. Another,[1143] somewhat straighter (12½ inches), found with a bronze buckler in the River Isis near Dorchester, Oxon,[1144] is shown in Fig. 366. It is now in the British Museum. There is a small rivet-hole passing transversely through it. Several[1145] other sheath ends of the same kind are preserved in the same collection. One, imperfect, from the Thames at Teddington (10 inches), with ribs along the middle and edges, has a hole for a diagonal rivet, and retains a fragment of wood inside, as does also another from the Thames at London, which has a very slightly projecting midrib. A third, of the same character (10¾ inches), from the Thames at Chelsea, has a small end plate secured by a central rivet. This has traces of either leather or wood inside.[1146] In another, also from the Thames (7¾ inches), the end plate has been cast with the sheath, and there is a wooden lining secured by a diagonal rivet. The opening is nearly flat.

In some there is no rib down the middle, but merely a projecting ridge, and in others no rivet-holes are visible.

This straight form of scabbard end has been very rarely found in Ireland. The only specimen mentioned by Wilde is by permission here reproduced as Fig. 367. Another (5½ inches) was in the collection of Mr. Wakeman, of Enniskillen.

A scabbard end of much the same general character as that from Guilsfield, but shorter and broader, is shown in Fig. 368. It was found at Wick Park, Stogursey, Somerset,[1147] with palstaves, socketed celts, gouges, spear-heads, and fragments of swords, together with jets from castings and rough metal.

Scabbard ends occur also in Scotland, for one nearly similar to these last (5¾ inches) was found with four leaf-shaped swords and a large spear-head, all of bronze, at Cauldhame, near Brechin, Forfarshire.[1148] They are now in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. The scabbard is by permission of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland here shown as Fig. 369. Another scabbard tip in the same museum is rather shorter. It was found at Gogar Burn, near Edinburgh, together with a sword and a penannular brooch of bronze and a small penannular ornament of gold. A Scotch specimen from the farm of Ythsie, Tarves, Aberdeenshire, is in the British Museum. It is like that from Brechin, and is 5½ inches long.

The straight form of scabbard end has been discovered, though rarely, in Northern France. One from Caix, Somme, is engraved in the Dictionnaire Archéologique de la Gaule. A fragment of another, more like Fig. 365, has been found near Compiègne (Oise).

A still shorter form is shown in Fig. 370, the original of which was found at Pant-y-maen, near Glancych, Cardiganshire,[1149] together with broken swords, spear-heads, and ferrules, as well as some small rings.

A still more simple form, and one more nearly approaching the modern chape, has occasionally been found. That shown as Fig. 371 formed part of the hoard found in Reach Fen, Cambridgeshire, which comprised also some fragments of swords. It is of especial interest, as the small bronze nail which served to fasten it to the wooden scabbard was found with it. This nail is shown above the chape in the figure.

Another chape of the same kind, but more like Fig. 372 in form, was found at Haines Hill, near Hythe, Kent,[1150] with a perforated disc of bronze, like Fig. 503, and some other objects.

Fig. 372, kindly lent by the Royal Irish Academy, shows a chape found at Cloonmore, near Templemore, Co. Tipperary.[1151] This form seems to be of very rare occurrence in Ireland.

It has, however, been found in Savoy,[1152] and in the Swiss Lake-dwellings.

An English form, which is, I believe, as yet unique, is shown in Fig. 373. It was found, with several broken swords and spear-heads, at Stoke Ferry, Norfolk. It is ornamented with a neat fluting, produced apparently by means of punches. The rivet-holes are at the sides, instead of being, as usual, on the face.

A curious socketed object in bronze, found near Piltown,[1153] in the barony of Iverk, Co. Kilkenny, has been regarded as the haft of a dagger. It is rectangular in section and expanding at the base which is closed. But from its analogy with some of the scabbard ends lately described it seems possible that it formed part of a sheath. The objection to this view is that the breadth of the socket is much greater than usual with these chapes. The zigzag and other ornamentation upon it is described as having been engraved with a fine point after the object was cast. The lower face is not ornamented.

The form is not unlike that of the end of the scabbard of some modern African leaf-shaped swords of iron, as to which Mr. Syer Cuming[1154] has remarked, that while the point of the blade is as sharp as a needle, the base of its receptacle measures nearly 3 inches across. It is possible that the object engraved as Fig. 286 may be intended for the end of a scabbard, and not for that of a hilt, but this can only be determined by future discoveries.

Another Irish form is shown in Fig. 374, the original of which was found at Keelogue Ford, in the Shannon, and is in the Royal Irish Academy. In this instance the chape has assumed a kind of boat-like form with pointed ends. As Sir W. Wilde[1155] has observed, the indentations at the top mark the overlapping of the wooden portion of the scabbard, which was fastened to the bronze by two slender rivets, so that the ends projected about an inch on each side.

Fig. 375 shows an English scabbard tip of the same class, though differing in details, which was found in the neighbourhood of Mildenhall, Suffolk, and is in the collection of Mr. Simeon Fenton, of that town, to whom I am indebted for permission to engrave it. The surface of this chape is beautifully finished, and the raised rib round the semicircular notch is delicately engrailed or “milled.” There is a single minute hole for a pin or rivet on one face only. As will be seen, this English example closely resembles that from Ireland shown in the previous figure.

Such projections as those on the chapes of this form would appear to be inconvenient; but in another variety the projecting ends shoot out into regular spikes, the ends of which are tipped by a small button. In some cases the length from point to point is not less than 8 inches. There are several in the museum of the Royal Irish Academy. Sir W. Wilde considered that the bronze sword was suspended high up on the thigh and not allowed to trail on the ground, so that these projections would be less in the way of the wearer than might at first sight appear. The lengthening of these points may have been the result of a kind of prehistoric dandyism, analogous to that which led to the lengthening of the points of boots and shoes in England at the beginning of the fifteenth century.[1156] Specimens of these still exist in which the points extend 6 inches beyond the foot, and it has been asserted that they had to be chained to the knees of the wearers to give them a chance of walking with freedom.

Though chiefly found in Ireland, this elongated form of scabbard has occasionally been discovered in England. Fig. 376 represents a specimen from the Thames, now preserved in the British Museum.

Another example, but slightly more curved, was found with a bronze sword at Ebberston, Yorkshire, and is in the Bateman Collection.[1157] It has been figured. The rivets for attaching it to the wooden scabbard are still in position.

This type of scabbard end has also been found in France. In the Museum of Bourges is an example about 5½ inches long, much like Fig. 376, but rather more V-shaped. Another, more like the figure, was found with a bronze sword, near Marsanne[1158] (Drôme), and a third in the tumulus of Barésia[1159] (Jura). Another was found at the end of an iron sword in a tumulus at Mons[1160] (Auvergne).

It is to be observed that the ends of some of the knife sheaths of the Early Iron Period[1161] expand in somewhat the same manner, so as to assume an anchor-like appearance.

A bronze bouterolle or scabbard tip of a very peculiar type, the sides being elongated and flattened out so as to form two sickle-shaped wings curving upwards, was exhibited to the Society of Antiquaries in 1867[1162] as having been found in Britain. A figure of it was to have appeared in the Archæologia, but has not yet been published. Perhaps there was room to doubt its English origin. Certainly the description, with the exception of the sickle-shaped wings curving upwards, agrees with a form of which several examples have been found in Germany and in France.[1163] Some of these are sharp at the end like a socketed celt, with two expanding sickle-like wings, but their purpose as chapes has not always been recognised. One from Hallstatt is described by Von Sacken[1164] as a cutting tool to be attached to a thin shaft. There are two in the Museum at Prague, found at Korno and Brasy.

One from Oberwald-behrungen is in the Museum at Würzburg. Another is at Hanover.

The fact that traces of wooden sheaths to daggers have been found in the Wiltshire and other barrows has already been mentioned, but no bronze fittings have been found with them. There are, however, some objects which may have served either as the mouth-pieces of sheaths for daggers or small knives, or as ferrules for their hilts.

One of these from the Harty hoard is shown full size in Fig. 377.

Another of identically the same character, but rather shorter, was found, with a bronze knife or dagger and numerous other articles, at Marden,[1165] Kent. It was regarded by Mr. Beale Poste as the mounting of the top of a dagger sheath formed of leather.

Another was found with various other relics near Abergele,[1166] Denbighshire.

Some elongated loops formed of jet are of a shape that would have served for the mouth-pieces of sword scabbards, but whether so fragile a substance was used for such a purpose may well be questioned. They may have been merely ornamental. One about 3 inches long, found in Scotland,[1167] has been regarded as a clasp for a belt. Possibly these objects in bronze may, after all, be of the nature of slides or clasps.

Another loop, more rounded at the ends, found in the peat at Newbury,[1168] Berks, has been described as a slider for securing some portion of the dress, or for passing over a belt. Not improbably this is their true interpretation. Some outer slides are described at p. 404.

Some bronze objects of nearly similar form, but about 3 inches in length, found with late Celtic remains, have been regarded as the cross-guards[1169] of daggers or knives.

In my own collection is a fine bronze sword from Denmark with broad side flanges to the hilt plate, on the blade of which is a bronze loop about ¼ inch wide, rebated for the reception of wood, but without any rivet-holes. Each face presents four parallel headings. For some time, in common with some Danish antiquaries, I regarded this loop as the mouth-piece of a scabbard, for which it appears well adapted; but I now find that such a view is erroneous, and that this loop is the ferrule for receiving the ends of the plates of wood or horn which formed the hilt. For in the barrow of Lydshöi,[1170] near Blidstrup, Frederiksborg, was a bronze sword with a similar ferrule upon it, and the remains of the plates of horn beneath it still in position. One of these Danish ferrules is of gold.[1171] A sheath[1172] from a barrow at Hvidegaard, made of birch wood with an outer and inner casing of leather, has a leather band for the mouth-piece, and a leather eye for receiving the belt. Some small sheaths for bronze knives and for a flint dagger found at the same time are simply of leather.

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XIV. SPEAR-HEADS, LANCE-HEADS, ETC

THERE can be but little doubt that one of the weapons of offence in earliest use among mankind must have been of the nature of a spear—a straight stick or staff, probably pointed and to a certain extent hardened in the fire. The idea of giving to such a staff a still harder and sharper point by attaching to it a head of bone or of stone, such as is still commonly in use among many savage tribes, would come next. And, lastly, these heads or points would be formed of metal, when its use for cutting tools and weapons had become general, and means had been discovered for rendering it available for this particular purpose. In the earlier part of the Bronze Age, when bronze was already in use for knife-daggers and even for daggers, it would appear that the spears and darts, if any such were in use, were in this country still tipped with flint. How long this practice continued it is impossible to say, and it is even doubtful whether any bronze spear-heads were in use before the time when the founders had discovered the art of making sockets by means of cores placed within the moulds. It is, however, not impossible that some of the blades found in the Wiltshire barrows, and the tanged weapons which have already been described in Chapter XI., may have been the heads of spears rather than the blades of daggers; but even at the period to which they belong the art of making cores must have been known, as the ferrule found at Arreton Down, and shown in Fig. 324, will testify, as well as the hollow socket of Fig. 328.

In the South-east of Europe and in Western Asia, as in Cyprus and at Hissarlik, tanged and not socketed spear-heads have been found in considerable numbers; but such a form is of very rare occurrence in Europe, and is unknown in Britain, unless possibly some of the blades already described as knives or daggers, such as Fig. 277, were attached to long rather than short handles, and should, therefore, have been treated of in this chapter rather than in that in which I have placed them. If spears were deposited in the graves with the dead, the shafts must in all probability have been broken, for as a rule the graves for bodies buried in the contracted position are not long enough to receive a spear of ordinary length.

In the case of some few ancient socketed tools of bronze, the socket has not been formed by casting over a core, but a wide plate of metal has been hammered over a conical mandril so as to form a socket like that of many chisels of the present day, and of the iron spear-heads of earlier times. I am not aware of any bronze instruments with the sockets formed in this manner ever having been found in this country. In all cases the sockets have been produced by cores in the casting, and in many spear-heads the adjustment of the core has been effected with such nicety that a conical hollow extends almost to the tip, with the metal around it of uniform substance, and often very thin in proportion to the size of the weapon.

The heads of arrows, bolts, darts, javelins, lances, and spears so nearly resemble one another in character, that it is impossible to draw any absolute line of distinction between them. The larger varieties must, however, have served for weapons retained in the hand as spears, while those of small and moderate size may have been for weapons thrown as lances, or possibly discharged as bolts or arrows. In length these instruments vary from about 2 inches to as much as 36 inches.

Sir W. Wilde[1173] has divided the Irish spear-heads into four varieties, as follows:—

1. The simple leaf-shaped, either long and narrow, or broad, with holes in the socket through which to pass the rivets to fix them to the shaft.

2. The looped, with eyes on each side of the socket below and on the same plane with the blade. These are generally of the long, narrow, straight-edged kind.

3. Those with loops in the angles between the edge of the blade and the socket.

4. Those with side apertures and perforations through the blade.

To these four classes may be added—

5. Those in which the base of each side of the blade projects at right angles to the socket, or is prolonged downwards so as to form barbs.

A remarkably fine specimen of a broad leaf-shaped spear-head of the first class is shown in Fig. 378. The original was found in the Thames at London, and still contains a portion of the wooden shaft smoothly and carefully pointed. The wood is, I think, ash; and my opinion is supported by that of Mr. Thiselton Dyer, F.R.S., who has kindly examined the shaft for me. There are no traces of the pin or rivet, which in the spear-heads of this character appears to have been formed of wood, horn, or bone, rather than of metal, probably with the view of the head being more readily detached from the shaft, in case the latter was broken. I have, however, a leaf-shaped bronze spear-head of this class, found in the Seine at Paris, in which a metallic rivet is still present. It is formed of a square rod of bronze, which at each end has been hammered into a spheroidal button, of at least twice the diameter of the hole through which the rivet passes. Portions of the wooden shaft are still adhering to the rivet. The wood in this instance also appears to be ash.

I have a rather narrower spear-head of the same type as Fig. 378 (10¾ inches), found with a bronze sword near Weymouth; and another identical in type with that from the Thames, but only 9 inches long, found in the county of Dublin.

Others of nearly the same form (12¾ inches and 8¾ inches) were found with a bronze sword in an ancient entrenchment at Worth,[1174] in the parish of Washfield, Devon.

Another spear-head of this type from the Thames[1175] (13½ inches) is in the British Museum, as are others (13 inches and 10 inches long).

A remarkably fine bronze spear-head, found in Lough Gur, Co. Limerick, with the lower part of the socket ornamented with gold, is of much the same form as Fig. 378, and is shown on the scale of one-fourth in Fig. 379. The ornamented part is shown on the scale of one-half in Fig. 380. It is in the collection of General A. Pitt Rivers, F.R.S., who has thus described the socket.[1176] Around it, “at top and bottom, are two ferrules of very thin gold, each ⅜ inch in width. Each ferrule is ornamented with three bands scored with from four to seven transverse lines, and separated from each other by two bands scored with incised longitudinal lines. The two ferrules are separated by a band about 3/16 inch in width, in which longitudinal lines of gold have been let into grooves in the bronze, leaving an intervening line between each of the gold lines.” Most of these gold strips have, however, now disappeared. The shaft of this spear is of bog oak 4 feet 8½ inches long, but though its authenticity has been accepted by many good judges, I must confess that I do not regard it as the original. Some other spear-heads ornamented with engraved lines, but not with inlaid gold, will be mentioned further on. I may incidentally recall the fact that the gold ring or ferrule around the spear-head of Hector is more than once mentioned by Homer.[1177]

πάροιθε δὲ λάμπετο δουρὸς Αἰχμὴ χαλκείν περὶ δὲ χρύσεος ϑέε πόρκης.

Another fine specimen of a spear-head with a long oval leaf-shaped blade in Canon Greenwell’s Collection is shown in Fig. 381. It was found with several others varying in length from 6⅝ inches to 11¼ inches, and numerous other articles of bronze and bone, in the Heathery Burn Cave,[1178] Durham. As will be seen, the blade is continued as a slight narrow projection along the socket as far as the rivet-hole. The edges are somewhat fluted.

A spear-head of nearly the same form (10½ inches) was found in a peat moss near the Camp Graves,[1179] Bewcastle, Cumberland. Another was found in a hoard at Bilton, Yorkshire.[1180]

A very fine example (about 15 inches), as well as a smaller one of the same type (about 8 inches), and one with lunate openings in the blade (Fig. 418), were found with two swords (see Fig. 351) near Whittingham,[1181] Northumberland.

I have others (9 inches to 11 inches) found with broken swords at Stoke Ferry, Norfolk, and from the Reach Fen hoard. The same form occurs in Ireland. I have a fine specimen (8⅝ inches) from Athlone. Another (13¼ inches) is engraved by Wilde as his Fig. 362. A very narrow spear-head, 14¾ inches long, and only 1⅜ inch wide, said to have been found in a barrow near Headford, Co. Galway, is in the British Museum.

A spear-head of this character from the Thames (16¾ inches), not fluted at the edges and quite plain, is in the British Museum. The blade is only 2¼ inches wide.

One from Stanwick, Yorkshire (8 inches), is in the British Museum, as is one (11 inches) from Bannockburn, Scotland. An Irish specimen (10 inches) is devoid of rivet-holes.

Another spear-head of nearly the same type, but of smaller dimensions, is given in Fig. 382. It was found, with some other spear-heads (Fig. 410), socketed celts (Figs. 155 and 157), palstaves (Fig 83), and a ferrule, to be subsequently mentioned, at Nettleham,[1182] near Lincoln, in 1860. They are now in the British Museum.

Others of the same type have been found at Winmarleigh[1183] and Cuerdale,[1184] Lancashire, at Wardlow,[1185] Derbyshire, Little Wenlock,[1186] Shropshire (8 inches), near Windsor[1187] (7 inches), at Bottisham,[1188] Cambridge, and in Herts.[1189]

I have one from the River Lea[1190] at St. Margaret’s, Herts, and others from Reach Fen, Cambridge.

Others were in the Guilsfield hoard,[1191] and in that of Pant-y-maen,[1192] or the Glancych hoard. One from the latter hoard is about 11 inches long. Another, more like Fig. 386, about 4 inches. With them were found fragments of swords, a scabbard tip, some rings and ferrules. Others (9 inches and 5 inches) were found, with a socketed celt and knife, a tanged chisel, and other objects, at Ty Mawr,[1193] on Holyhead Mountain.

Five were found in the hoard near Stanhope,[1194] Durham, with socketed celts, a gouge, &c.

Of Scottish specimens the following may be noticed: one from Lanark[1195] (5¾ inches), which has been figured; two (7¾ inches) rather long in the socket, found with a bronze sword and a long pin on the Point of Sleat,[1196] Isle of Skye; one (6 inches) from Balmaclellan,[1197] New Galloway. One (5⅛ inches) from Duddingston Loch, Edinburgh, is in the British Museum.

Leaf-shaped spear-heads such as Fig. 382 are of frequent occurrence in various parts of France. A number were found at Alise Ste. Reine[1198] (Côte d’Or), several of them ornamented with rings round the sockets.

They also are found in the Lake-dwellings of Switzerland[1199] and Savoy. Many of them have parallel rings round the mouth of the socket by way of ornament. They also occur in Germany[1200] and Denmark.[1201] One from Northern Germany, still containing a part of its wooden shaft, has been engraved by Von Estorff.[1202]

Those from Italy and Greece have very frequently facets running along the midrib which contains the socket.

In Fig. 383 is shown a variety (11½ inches) with a projecting fillet running down to the rivet-holes as in Fig. 381, which, however, in this case forms the termination of small beads running along the sides of the central rib. There is also a beading running along the midrib. The original was found, with another spear-head, plain, a socketed celt, some bronze rings, and fragments of tin, at Achtertyre,[1203] Morayshire. Mr. R. Day, F.S.A., has a nearly similar spear-head (5 inches), found in Dublin.

A more elongated form, with the projecting part of the socket considerably shorter, is shown in Fig. 384, from a specimen found in the North of Ireland. A spear-head (20 inches) of the same form of outline, but with a slight ridge running the whole length of the socket from its mouth to the point, was found at Ditton,[1204] Surrey. It is now in the British Museum, having been presented by the Earl of Lovelace.

Another (14⅝ inches) in the same collection, found in the River Thames,[1205] near the mouth of the Wandle, retains a portion of the original wood in its socket. It was found in company with a bronze sword, a palstave, and a long pin (Fig. 454).

One of much the same form as the figure (11 inches) was found at Teigngrace,[1206] Devon. It has a delicate bead running down each side of the midrib, and continued as a square projection below the blade.

Canon Greenwell has a long spear-head (14½ inches) from Quy Fen, with grooves running up the blade at the side of the socket. The ends of the blade are truncated so as to leave projections on the sides of the socket above the rivet-hole. These are slightly ornamented.

I have seen another spear-head (11½ inches) with the base of the blade slightly truncated in a similar manner. It was found near Eastbourne.

This elongated form is of common occurrence in Denmark and Northern Germany,[1207] the necks being usually ornamented by delicate punch-marking or possibly engraving.

A broader variety, with the socket considerably enlarged in the part extending below the blade, is shown in Fig. 385. The original was found in company with other spear-heads like Fig. 382 from 5⅝ inches to 10⅝ inches long, two socketed celts with three vertical lines on the face like Fig. 125, and two somewhat conical plates with central holes, near Newark, and is in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S.

A spear-head (6½ inches) not quite so broad in its proportions, said to have been found in a tumulus, near Lewes,[1208] Sussex, is in the British Museum, as is another (6½ inches) found near Bakewell, Derbyshire.

A spear-head of the same general outline as Fig. 385, but with the sides of the socket straighter, was found with others, as well as with 16 socketed celts, a knife, fragments of swords and of a quadrangular tube (qy. a scabbard?) and a long ferrule, near Nottingham.[1209]

It is often the case that the sides of the upper part of the blade are nearly straight, and the socket itself appears large in proportion to the width of the blade. Such a spear- or lance-head from the Reach Fen hoard is shown in Fig. 386. I have several others from the Fen districts, as well as one of a shorter and broader form (5 inches) with a large socket extending only an inch below the blade, found at Walthamstow, Essex.

A spear-head from Unter-Uhldingen[1210] exhibits the same narrowness of blade in proportion to the size of the socket.

In some cases the blade and socket are of nearly equal length.

Fig. 387 is here by permission reproduced from Wilde’s Catalogue, Fig. 367. It is only 3½ inches long, and may have been the head of a dart or javelin rather than of a spear. I have an example of nearly the same form and size from Co. Dublin. One in the British Museum is only 2 inches long, though the mouth of the socket is ¾ inch in diameter.

Some of these very small weapons may possibly have served to point arrows. In the Norwich Museum is a head like Fig. 387, but with the blade shorter in proportion and narrower, the total length of which is only 1-11/16 inch. The blade is ½ inch wide, and the socket is only ⅜ inch in external diameter. A bronze arrow-head is said to have been found in the Isle of Portland,[1211] but particulars are not given. Another small point, in form rather like Fig. 386, and only 3⅛ inches long, was found at Llan-y-mynech Hill,[1212] Montgomeryshire. Another, 3½ inches, was found near Pyecombe,[1213] Sussex.

One 4 inches long is said to have been found in Yorkshire.[1214]

Some double-pointed arrow-heads of bronze are mentioned as having been found in Ireland,[1215] but in point of fact these were “razors” like Fig. 274.

In this country,[1216] however, and not improbably in others, during the period when bronze was in use for cutting tools and the larger weapons, flint still served as the material from which arrow-heads were usually made. Such a method of taking the census as that devised by the Scythian king Ariantas would in Britain have produced but small results; at all events, but few of the inhabitants would have been able each to contribute his bronze arrow-head. Many of the bronze arrow-heads found on the Continent appear to belong to the Early Iron Age, but it is mainly in southern countries that they have been found.

In Egypt[1217] and Arabia they have occurred of the leaf-shaped as well as of the three-edged form, which latter is common in Greece.

Some spear-heads appear to have had the form of their point somewhat modified by grinding, as if from time to time they became blunted by use and required to be re-sharpened. A kind of ogival outline such as is shown in Fig. 388 appears, however, to have been intentional. The original was found in the North of Ireland.

This ogival outline is of frequent occurrence among the bronze spear-heads from Hungary.

The lance-head shown in Fig. 389, also from Wilde (Fig. 368), has the blade of a trapezoid rather than of a leaf-shaped form, and in general character more nearly approaches the looped variety, Fig. 397, than those now under consideration. The socket also appears to be quadrangular rather than round.

It will now be well to speak of some of the spear-heads of this class which have either their sockets or their blades ornamented by engraving or punching.

In Fig. 390 is shown a spear-head from the Reach Fen hoard, the nature of the ornamentation on which will be seen from the cut. The five bands, each of four parallel lines around the socket, have the appearance of being engraved; but I think that this is not actually the case, but that the lines have been punched in with a chisel-like punch. The short transverse dotted lines have probably been made with a serrated punch.

Another spear-head, with ornamentation of a nearly similar character, is shown in Fig. 391. This example was found at Thorndon, Suffolk,[1218] in company with a hammer (Fig. 210), a knife (Fig. 240), a gouge (Fig. 204), and an awl (Fig. 224), the whole of which are now in the British Museum. Another in the same collection from Thames Ditton (6⅛ inches) has three sets of three rings each, with short vertical lines above the upper ring.

A small lance-head of this type (4½ inches), found at Ingham, Norfolk, with socketed celts, has one band of four parallel lines round the socket. It is now in the Mayer Collection at Liverpool. Another from the Broadward hoard (Shropshire)[1219] has two bands of four, and one of two rings, the latter close to the mouth of the socket. A second in the same hoard shows eight rings near the mouth of the socket, and a line running down each side of the midrib prolonged below the blade as far as the rivet-hole which it encloses. A spear-head from the hoard found at Beddington, near Croydon,[1220] is ornamented in nearly the same manner. It was found with a gouge, socketed celts, a portion of celt mould, &c. That from Culham, near Abingdon, shown in Fig. 392, has three sets of four rings and one of two, as well as some vertical dotted lines above the upper ring. In this case the bands seem to have been punched in with a serrated punch which produced four short lines at each stroke, and by skilful manipulation these short lines were made to join so as to form a continuous ring.

I have a spear-head from Lakenheath, Suffolk (5⅞ inches), with a small raised band cast on the socket just below the rivet-hole.

A spear-head (6½ inches) in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh, found near Forfar, is ornamented with two bands of three parallel lines round the socket.

The sockets of some Irish spear-heads are highly decorated. That of a long leaf-shaped specimen from Athenry, Co. Galway, is shown in Fig. 393, kindly lent me by the Royal Irish Academy. It is Fig. 382 in Wilde’s Catalogue, in which also some other examples are engraved. The chevron ornament and the alternate direction of the hatching are highly characteristic of the style of the Bronze Period.

A similar decoration is found on English specimens. One found at Bilton, Yorkshire,[1221] with other spear-heads, fragments of swords, and socketed celts, has round the socket three bands of triangles alternately hatched and plain, and the blade is ornamented with a single row of the same kind on each side of the central rib. One from Edington Burtle, Somerset (4½ inches), in the Taunton Museum, has a band of hatched triangles above three bands of parallel lines with transverse lines between.

A broken spear-head from the Broadward[1222] find has the blade ornamented in the same way. A row of plain triangles is left on each side of the midrib, while the rest of the blade is hatched, the set of parallel lines in each point between the plain triangles being alternately to the right and to the left.

A fragment of a blade from the Haynes Hill hoard,[1223] Kent, has ring ornaments engraved along each side of the midrib.

As has already been observed, the edges of this class of spear-heads are not unfrequently fluted, but it occasionally happens that the whole blade is ornamented by minute ribs and flutings. The spear-head (10½ inches) found with two swords and two ferrules at Fulbourn, Cambridge,[1224] affords an example of this kind. On each side of the central rib containing the socket are two sharp ridges one below the other, next comes a hollow fluting, then a ridge, and then the fluting which forms the edge. To judge from the engraving, another found at Gringley, Nottinghamshire,[1225] must also have been fluted in a somewhat similar manner.

The discovery of other leaf-shaped spear-heads with rivet-holes through the sockets is recorded to have been made at the following places, and many others might no doubt be added to the list: the Thames, near Battersea[1226] (16¾ inches); near Wallingford[1227] (7¼ inches); and Kingston[1228] (6½ and 7-6/10 inches); two (7¾ inches and 6 inches) were found near Toddington, Beds;[1229] at Beacon Hill, Charnwood Forest, Leicestershire,[1230] two (7½ inches and 6½ inches) were found with a socketed celt and gouge. Others were discovered near Yarlet, Staffordshire;[1231] near Alnwick Castle[1232] (sixteen with celts and swords); Vronheulog, Merionethshire;[1233] and Longy Common, Alderney[1234] (one with blade ornamented).

The spear-heads of the second of the classes into which they are here divided are those with loops at the side of the projecting socket. These loops are usually more elongated than those on socketed celts and palstaves, though they probably served a similar purpose, that of securing the metallic head to the wooden handle. The metal of which the loops are formed has frequently been flattened by hammering, so as to reduce the projection of the loops beyond the socket; the flattened part is often wrought into a lozenge form.

The strings which passed through these loops were probably secured to some stop or collar on the shaft, and may have been arranged in some chevron-like pattern with which these lozenges coincided. There are usually no rivet-holes in the spear-heads of this class.

A specimen exhibiting these lozenges, and with the blade of nearly the same form as those of the spear-heads of the first class, is shown in Fig. 394. The upper part of the midrib containing the socket is ridged, so that the section near the point is almost square. The socket is slightly fluted round the mouth. The original was found at Thetford, Suffolk.

A spear-head of the same type, but with only a single large loop, found in Glen Kenns, Galloway, is engraved in the Archæologia,[1235] but it seems probable that the figure is somewhat inaccurate.

Another (5½ inches) with two loops was found at Hangleton Down, Sussex.[1236] Another (5¼ inches), rather more elongated than Fig. 394, was found at Trefeglwys, Montgomeryshire.[1237] Another from Shirewood Forest is engraved in the Archæologia.[1238] It has a slightly ogival outline on each side, a peculiarity I have noticed in other specimens. An example given in the same plate seems to have lost the flat part of the blade.

I have one (6¼ inches) from Fyfield, near Abingdon.

Mr. M. Fisher has a specimen from the Fens at Ely (5⅜ inches), with the midrib ridged like Fig. 396.

One from Hagbourn Hill, near Chiltern, Berks,[1239] is reported to have been found with a socketed celt, a pin like Fig. 458, and another like Fig. 453, together with a bronze bridle-bit, and some portions of buckles like those of the late Celtic Period. These are now in the British Museum. A few coins of gold and silver are said to have been found at the same time.

One (6 inches) was found at Chartham, near Canterbury.[1240]

One, 5 inches long, from the Thames, is in the British Museum. It has a small ridge or bead along the mid-feather. The loops have a diamond engraved or punched upon them.

In one from Beckhampton, Wilts[1241] (4¾ inches), the side loops do not appear to be flattened.

The form is of not unfrequent occurrence in Ireland, though perhaps that with the raised ribs on the blade, like Fig. 397, is more common.

In one instance (13½ inches)[1242] the loops upon the socket are not opposite each other, though, as usual, in the same plane as the blade.

A small specimen (5¼ inches) from Fairholme, Lockerbie, Dumfriesshire, is in the British Museum.

A small example of this type (about 3½ inches) is in the collection formed by Sir R. Colt Hoare at Stourhead, and now at Devizes, and in the same case with the dagger blades. It has been figured by the late Dr. Thurnam[1243] in his valuable memoir in the Archæologia, and is thought by him to have been found in a grave with burnt bones in one of the Wilsford barrows near Stonehenge.

There is a diminutive variety of this class of weapon with two loops, in which the blade is extremely narrow, like that from Lakenheath shown in Fig. 395. I have another, 4⅞ inches, with even a smaller and shorter blade, from Cumberland.

Canon Greenwell has one only 3 inches long, found near Nottingham. It has three parallel grooves round the socket mouth. One, 4¼ inches, from Ashdown, Berks, is in the British Museum.

A fragment of another of very small dimensions was found at Farley Heath, Surrey, and is now in the British Museum.

A lance-head with a more leaf-shaped blade (6¼ inches) is said to have been found in a tumulus at Craigton, near Kinross.[1244]

An Irish example, 2⅜ inches long, and comparatively broad in proportion to its length, has been regarded as an arrow-head. It was found at Clonmel, Co. Tipperary.[1245] It has probably been broken and repointed. An example much like Fig. 395 is engraved by Wilde as his Fig. 379.

In some cases there is a ridge running along the whole or a great part of the midrib on the blade so as to make the section near the point almost cruciform. An example of this kind from the neighbourhood of Cambridge is shown in Fig. 396. In this case the side loops are unusually near the mouth of the socket, the cavity of which extends about half-way along the blade. Canon Greenwell has an example of this type (6½ inches), from Langton, Lincolnshire, with a longer socket, and the loops about half-way along it.

This ribbing along the midrib is of frequent occurrence on Irish spear-heads, and was probably intended to strengthen as well as to decorate the blade. The projecting ribs on the flat part of the blade were also probably added for the same purpose. Fig. 397 shows a spear-head with these ridges, found in the North of Ireland.

The blade is carried down as a slight projection along the socket until it meets the side loops, the outer faces of which are expanded into lozenges.

I have a shorter example (5½ inches) from Old Kilpatrick, Dumbartonshire, Scotland; one from Termon, Co. Tyrone, is engraved in the Archæological Journal.[1246]

In some the blade is proportionally wider and shorter. I have one from near Enniskillen (7¼ inches), in which the blade between the socket and the ribs is so thin that two long holes have been eaten or worn through it, giving it the appearance of belonging to the perforated class to be subsequently described.

An Irish specimen much like Fig. 397 is engraved in “Horæ Ferales.”[1247]

A small broad-bladed form is of very common occurrence in Ireland. An example is given in Fig. 398. Another is engraved by Wilde (Fig. 369). Some have two diagonal ribs on each side of the blade instead of only one. A rather more pointed form is given by Vallancey.[1248] There are others figured in the “Horæ Ferales.”[1249]

This type is of rare occurrence in England, but one (4½ inches?) much like Fig. 398 was ploughed up at Heage,[1250] in the parish of Duffield, Derbyshire, and another (4⅝ inches) was found near Lincoln.[1251]

A gracefully shaped spear-head, with parallel beadings upon the blade, and having very flat loops with pointed oval faces on the socket, was found in the Thames, and formed part of the Roach Smith Collection, now in the British Museum. It is shown in Fig. 399, and appears to be unique of its kind. A plain spear-head (7 inches) of much the same form, and another of the same length, but wider and flatter, were found at Edington Burtle, Somerset, and are now in the Museum at Taunton.

A very remarkable specimen in the Royal Irish Academy is engraved as Fig. 400. It has already been figured on a small scale by Wilde, who thus describes it:[1252] “A long narrow spear with concave or recurved sides, and long lozenge-shaped loops on each side of the socket, where the circular form of that portion of the weapon becomes angular. Narrow lateral ridges connect these loops with the base of the blade, which has hollow bevelled edges, and is as sharp as the day it came from the mould. The socket margin is decorated with a fillet of five elevations, and a double linear engraved or punched ornament forming a triangular pattern like that seen in some antique gold ornaments. A sharp ridge extends along the middle of the socket from the loops to the point, on each side of which, as well as in the angles between the blade and the socket, there are lines of small oval punched indentations apparently effected by the hand.”

In one of the looped forms both the blade and the socket are often highly ornamented. The socket part is made to appear somewhat like a haft to the blade, as in the Arreton Down specimen (Fig. 328), and the blade itself has ridges running nearly parallel to the edges, the midrib being almost square in section. An example of this kind from Ballymena is, by the kindness of Mr. R. Day, F.S.A., shown in Fig. 401. As will be seen, the socket, blade, and external faces of the loops are all ornamented with engraved and punctured lines. A beautiful example from Ireland (6½ inches), the socket engraved with a double ring of chevrons near the middle, and a single ring near the base, and also ornamented with dotted circles and lines extending down the blade, is in the British Museum. It has two knobs on each side of the socket simulating rivets.

Other varieties with the midrib more rounded are given by Wilde,[1253] and two of his figures are, by the kindness of the Council of the Royal Irish Academy, here reproduced as Figs. 402 and 403.[1254] The original of Fig. 402 is 5 inches long. It has “a central circular stud opposite the base of the blade, beneath which there are a series of minute continuous lines margined on both sides by a row of elevated dots.” The socket and the outer surface of the loops are also highly decorated.

Fig. 403 is 7½ inches long, and is also artistically ornamented.

An example of this kind is given in “Horæ Ferales.”[1255]

One (5¼ inches) from the Dean Water, Forfarshire, is in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh. The blade is ornamented by incised lines and punctulations.

Fig. 404, also kindly lent by the Royal Irish Academy (Wilde, Fig. 378), shows a smaller and a plainer type.

An unornamented lance-head of this type (5 inches) was found at Peel,[1256] in the Isle of Man. Another, 5⅝ inches, with three bands of parallel lines round the socket, was obtained at Douglas, Lanarkshire.[1257]

The spear-heads of this class with loops at the side of the sockets are almost unknown out of the British Islands. In my own collection, however, is one from the Seine at Paris (6¼ inches), almost identical in form with Fig. 394, but with the lozenge-shaped plates forming the loops somewhat wider.

A highly ornamented spear-head from Hungary,[1258] preserved in the Museum at Buda-Pest, has small semicircular loops at the sides of the socket.

The third class of spear-heads consists of those with loops at the base of the blade connecting it with the socket. There are many varieties of this class, which includes some of the most elegant forms of these ancient weapons. The reason for adopting this particular kind of loop appears to be that they were, when thus attached to the blade, less liable to be broken off or damaged than when they formed isolated projections from the socket. The spear-heads were also more readily polished and furbished when the socket was left as a plain tube.

The loops are very frequently formed by the continuation of two ribs along the margin of the blade, which are curved inwards from the base of the blade until they join the socket.

A good example of this formation of the loop is shown in Fig. 405. The original was found at Elford, Northumberland, and is in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S.

Another of nearly the same form, but without the ribs on the blade, was found near Lowthorpe, Yorkshire, E.R., and is in the possession of Mr. T. Boynton, of Ulrome Grange.

The very graceful spear-head shown in Fig. 406 was found at Isleham Fen, Cambridge, in 1863, and is a remarkably fine casting, the cavity for the reception of the shaft being no less than 12¼ inches in length, and perfectly central in the blade.

I have another spear-head of the same type (18 inches), probably from the Thames, almost as well cast, but rather heavier in proportion to its size. There are traces of wood in the socket, as is also the case in another of the same form (14½ inches) dredged from the Thames at Battersea,[1259] and now in the Bateman Collection. The wood has been thought to be ash. Another similar, but originally about 20 inches long, was found in the Thames near Runnymede;[1260] and another in the collection of General A. Pitt Rivers, F.R.S., 17 inches long, was found at Hampton Court.

Another (13¾ inches) from the Thames at Thames Ditton is in the British Museum.

One (15¼ inches) from Bottisham Lode, Cambridge, is in the British Museum; as is another (14¼ inches) from the New River Works, Pentonville. I have seen others from Coveney Fen (16¾ inches, Mr. Fisher), and from Woolpit, near Bury St. Edmunds (8⅞ inches). The blade of one (11⅜ inches) without the socket was found at Stanwick, Yorkshire, and is now in the British Museum.

One (13½ inches) was found with three rapier-shaped blades near Maentwrog, Merionethshire, and is in the same collection.[1261]

Another, broken, in the Museum at Taunton, is said to have been found in the Roman villa at Wadsford, Combe St. Nicholas, near Chard. Its original length must have been about 18 inches.

In the specimen from Stibbard, Norfolk,[1262] shown in Fig. 407, the ribs upon the blade are less distinct, and the loops are widened out so as to show a lozenge form when the edge of the blade is seen. This spear-head was found with nine others and about seventy palstaves about 1806, and is in the state in which it left the mould, having never been finished by hammering and grinding, though the core has been extracted. I have seen a specimen in the collection of Mr. J. Holmes, found at Morley, near Leeds, in which the hammering process had been applied to a part only of the blade, which had evidently broken in the operation. The partly finished base and the unfinished point were found together.

An Irish example of this form has been engraved by Vallancey.[1263]

This type is rare in France, but a specimen is in the Museum at Carcassonne (Aude), and another in that at St. Germain.

In some spear-heads of nearly the same form there is a raised bead running down the midrib as in Fig. 408. This beautifully finished weapon was bought in Dublin, but I cannot say in what part of Ireland it was found.

A smaller and broader specimen (7 inches) in my collection was found at Clough, near Antrim.

I have another (10¾ inches) from the north of Ireland in which the midrib half-way along the blade expands to form an edge almost as sharp as that at the sides. Near the point the section is cruciform, as in Fig. 396.

A spear-head found near Hay, on the river Wye, and now in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of London, presents the same peculiarity as Fig. 408.

Some ancient bronze spear-heads from China[1264] are provided with central ridges of the same kind on the blades. They have but one loop, and that is on the face, and there is a deep notch at the mouth of the socket.

The long blades are often more leaf-shaped and less truncated at the base than that shown in Fig. 406. A very large specimen of this kind from Lakenheath Fen is shown on the scale of ¼ inch in Fig. 409. The point is unfortunately lost, but is restored in the engraving. The midrib containing the socket is ridged, and the outer faces of the loops expand into the diamond form.

One of nearly the same character (22¼ inches), found in the Thames at Datchet, forms part of the Roach Smith Collection,[1265] now in the British Museum. Another (11½ inches) was found with palstaves at Sherford,[1266] near Taunton.

A specimen in the British Museum (15¾ inches) has an ornament of hatched chevrons round the base of the socket, and the lozenge-shaped flanges are also ornamented with hatched open mascles.

A spear-head of the same form (15½ inches) from Ireland[1267] has the ridge decorated with lines of dots, and the socket with bands and a chevron pattern. A plain specimen, no less than 26¾ inches long, found at Maghera, Co. Londonderry,[1268] has been figured by Wilde.

In others the midrib is conical, and the blade nearly flat, or with only a shallow channel along the sides of the midrib. One such from the find at Nettleham, Lincolnshire,[1269] now in the British Museum, is, by the kindness of Mr. Franks, shown in Fig. 410. I have one nearly similar (9½ inches) from Edmonton Marsh. One (7½ inches) from the Thames at Lambeth is in the British Museum, as are others from the same river varying in length from 9 to 15¾ inches.

One from Speen, Berks[1270] (7 inches), is of the same character, as is one (8¼ inches) from Crawford, Lanarkshire.[1271] Another (9 inches) from Horsey, near Peterborough, Hunts, has been engraved by Artis.[1272] Another (10½ inches) from the Severn at Kempsey, Worcestershire,[1273] appears to have been of this type. I have seen others from the Cambridge Fens. One (5½ inches) from Edington Burtle, Somerset, is in the Taunton Museum.

A spear-head of this character (10½ inches), with the faces of the loops lozenge-shaped, was found with two looped palstaves and a chisel (Fig. 197) at Broxton, about twelve miles south of Chester. It is now in the collection of Sir P. de M. G. Egerton, Bart., who has kindly shown it to me.

Spear-heads of this character are occasionally found in Scotland. Two from Wigtonshire[1274] have been figured.

The form is common in Ireland. I have one 12 inches long from one of the northern counties.

A spear-head (6½ inches) with small projecting loops at each side of the blade was found near Hawick, Roxburghshire.[1275]

In Fig. 411 is shown a remarkably fine spear-head in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S., which exhibits the peculiarity of having the loops formed by the prolongation of small ribs on each side of the midrib, and of having, in addition, a rivet-hole through the socket. It was found at Knockans, Co. Antrim.

An Irish spear-head (14¾ inches) with loops at the lower end of the blade, and the socket pierced for a rivet, was exhibited to the Archæological Institute in 1856.[1276]

The fourth class of spear-heads, those with openings in the blade, may again be subdivided into those in which the openings appear to have served as loops for attaching the blade to the shaft, and those in which these apertures seem to have been mainly intended for ornament, or possibly for diminishing weight.

Of the former kind appear to be those which have merely two small slits in the lower part of the blade, such as would seem adapted for the insertion of a cord. These holes are usually protected by projections rising from the blade on the outer side of the holes.

A fine spear-head in my own collection thus perforated, found near Lurgan, Co. Armagh,[1277] is shown in Fig. 412. It is 24 inches in length, and 3¼ inches in extreme breadth.

The openings are about 17 inches from the point. An Irish friend has suggested that they were for the reception of poison, but after the blade had penetrated seventeen inches into the human body such an use of poison would probably be superfluous.

A spear-head of the same form (19⅛ inches) was found on the hill of Rosele, Duffus, Morayshire,[1278] and is now in the Elgin Museum. Another, broken, but still 10⅝ inches long, was found with a rapier-shaped blade at Corbridge, Northumberland.[1279] A broken specimen was found in the Isle of Portland.[1280]

A spear-head (10 inches) with small openings in the blade was found, with palstaves, socketed celts, rapiers, bracelets, and a ferrule, at Wallington, Northumberland, and is in the possession of Sir Charles Trevelyan.

An “eyed” spear-head 22 inches long was found in the Thames near Datchet,[1281] but whether it was of this or some other type I cannot say. One (9 inches) with two holes at the base of the leaf above the ferrule was found near Speen, Berks.[1282]

A broader form (13½ inches) from Ireland is engraved by Wilde (Fig. 365), and another broader still is shown in my Fig. 413. This has a rivet-hole on the front of the socket, as well as the holes in the blade. This is also in the Dublin Museum.

In some instances the blade is very much shorter in proportion to the length of the socket, as will be seen in Fig. 414, the original of which was found in the county of Antrim, and is now in Canon Greenwell’s collection.

A remarkably fine English example of the same class is shown in Fig. 415. This specimen was found in the Thames, and is now in the British Museum. The small projecting flanges at the side of the holes in the blade are very strongly marked, and form circular discs when seen with the edge of the spear-head towards the spectator.

The simplest of the forms, in which the holes in the blade appear to be for ornament rather than use, is that in which there are two circular or oval holes through the blade, one on either side of the midrib containing the socket. The spear-head shown in Fig. 416 was found near Naworth Castle, Cumberland, in 1870, and is in the collection of Canon Greenwell. In general form it resembles the type, Fig. 381. It is provided with a rivet-hole through the socket.

Some Italian spear-heads have two circular holes in the blade, but nearer the base.

In the spear-head shown in Fig. 417 there is no trace of a rivet-hole in the socket, the end of which, however, is broken, and the two oval orifices in the blade are placed one somewhat below the other. This specimen is in Canon Greenwell’s collection, and was found at Blakehope, Northumberland.

The more truly characteristic spear-heads of this class have two crescent-shaped or lunate openings, one on each side of the midrib containing the socket, which thus is made, as it were, to reappear in the middle of the blade. There is usually a rivet-hole in the projecting part of the socket below the blade, so that these openings must be regarded as ornamental, or else as intended to diminish the weight of the weapon.

The original of Fig. 418 was found about 1847, near Whittingham, Northumberland,[1283] in company with some other spear-heads and two swords, and is now in the possession of Lord Ravensworth. The surface of the blade is ornamented by being worked into steps or terraces, and the socket by bands of parallel lines.

A rather longer specimen was found, together with a plain leaf-shaped spear-head and five socketed celts, at Winmarleigh, near Garstang, Lancashire.[1284] By the kindness of the curators of the Warrington Museum I am enabled to give it as Fig. 419. It is 19½ inches long. There are small ridges by the side of the midrib and round the margin of the openings.

Another like it, but only 15¼ inches long, was found with a socketed celt near Middleham, Yorkshire.

Some fragments of spear-heads of this character were found with other bronze antiquities in Duddingston Loch, Edinburgh.[1285]

The same form has occurred in Ireland.[1286] A fine example (14 inches) from a hoard at Dowris, King’s County,[1287] is in the British Museum.

A spear-head of this type, about 8 inches long, is in the Boucher de Perthes Collection at Abbeville.

A spear-head smaller than Fig. 419, but of the same general character, is shown in Fig. 420. It was found in Burwell Fen, Cambridge, about 1869. There is a double bead along each side of the midrib, and the blade is in two steps or terraces. Around the crescent-shaped opening the beading is grained or milled transversely. A projection is carried down along the socket from the blade, so as to allow the rivet-hole to be made in it. The socket extends to within 1½ inches of the point.

A spear-head of nearly the same size, with the openings somewhat smaller, but ornamented in a similar manner, was found with celts, palstaves, gouges, swords, scabbards, &c., at Guilsfield, Montgomeryshire,[1288] in 1862. Another, broken, was found at the same time. Another was in the hoard at Little Wenlock, Shropshire,[1289] but does not appear to have been ornamented. There was a fragment of another, plain, in the Broadward[1290] find.

In the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh are some spear-heads of this character, with the openings on the blade rather longer in proportion. One was found in the bottom of a cairn at Highfield, Urray, near Dingwall, Ross-shire.[1291] Others were found in Roxburghshire and Stirlingshire.

Some of the spear-heads of this type which have been found in Ireland are highly ornamented. A very fine specimen given by Wilde (Fig. 374) has several mouldings with a kind of cable pattern upon them. Others have circular perforations in addition to the lunate openings; and in one instance the socket is decorated with bands and vertical lines (Wilde, Fig. 372).

A small lance-head from Jelabugy, Russia,[1292] with comparatively large crescent-shaped openings in the blade, has been figured by Worsaae.

The cut for Fig. 421 is kindly lent me by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. The original, 19 inches long, was found with a bronze sword at Denhead, Cupar-Angus, Forfarshire,[1293] and has unfortunately been somewhat broken.

As will be seen, there are ten circular holes, besides two long crescents. The socket is said by Professor Daniel Wilson to contain a thin rod or core of iron, which was inserted in the mould to strengthen this unusually large weapon; but what seemed to Dr. Wilson to be an iron rod is really a piece of wood that has been recently inserted when the spear-head was mended.

In the last class into which these weapons are here divided, are placed those which are barbed at the base of the blade, or in very rare instances are square at that part.

A good typical example (10-7/12 inches) is shown in Fig. 422, from an original found at Speen, Berks.[1294] It is very heavy, weighing 11¾ ozs. troy, or more than ¾ lb. avoirdupois. Another of the same size, but lighter (8 ozs.), was found in the Severn, near Worcester.[1295]

Another (10¾ inches), found in the Plaistow Marshes, Essex, and now in the British Museum, has a rivet of bronze 2⅜ inches in length still in the rivet-hole. Curiously enough this long rivet appears to be a speciality of this class of weapons. Some of this type, together with some fragments twisted and adhering together as if partially molten, were found in the Thames at Kingston,[1296] and in one of them was the bronze rivet. These are now in the British Museum. Some broken barbed spear-heads of larger size (about 14 inches), also with the rivets still in position, were found with bronze ferrules at a spot called “Bloody Pool,” South Brent, Devon.[1297]

Another (7 inches), found at Pendoylan, near Cardiff, Glamorganshire,[1298] has an oval socket pierced on one side for a rivet, which, however, is wanting.

Canon Greenwell, F.R.S., possesses an example much like that from Speen (10⅞ inches) found in Yorkshire, near the river Humber.

In the Broadward find[1299] (Shropshire) were several spear-heads of this type, mostly retaining their bronze rivets. One of them, about 6 inches long and 3 inches broad, has the base of the blade at right angles to the socket, and not sloping downwards. Several bronze ferrules were included in the hoard. What appears to have been a discovery of nearly the same character took place in a bog on a farm called the Wrekin Tenement,[1300] also in Shropshire, where a celt, a small number of swords, and about one hundred and fifty fragments of spear-heads were found. They are described as being for the most part about 8 inches in length, and having rivets of bronze through the sockets. I have not met with the type in Scotland or Ireland.

It has been suggested that these weapons were fishing spears, and certainly their barbed form, so distinct from that of the more common spear-heads, raises a presumption that they were intended for some special purpose. It appears to me, however, as it already has done to others, that such weapons are too clumsy to have been used for the capture of fish of any ordinary size, and would have made sad havoc even of a forty-pound salmon. If they were used for the chase at all, it is more probable that they were intended for attacking large four-footed game, such as wild oxen, either by thrusting or darting, and that the weapons were left in the wound, the shafts encumbering the animal in its flight. If, as would probably be the case, these got broken by the animal, the long rivets were well adapted for being removed so as to allow of the broken shaft being taken out, and would again serve to retain a new one.

Mention has already been made of ferrules having been frequently discovered in company with ordinary spear-heads; and from this fact, and the size and character of the ferrules, the inference has, with much probability, been drawn that they served to tip the lower ends of the shafts of spears and lances.

The illustrations given in Figs. 423 and 424 will serve to show the usual character of these objects. They vary in length from about 16 inches down to 8 inches, and are about ¾ inch or less in diameter. They are not made from a flat piece of metal turned over, but are cast in one piece, having been very carefully “cored.” The metal, especially near the mouth, is very thin, and there is usually a small hole nearer this end than the other to allow of a pin or rivet being inserted to keep the ferrule on the shaft.

The original of Fig. 423 (8¼ inches) was found with spear-heads and other articles at Nettleham, near Lincoln, and is now in the British Museum.[1301]

One 14 inches long, bluntly pointed at the base, was found in the Thames, near London, and is now in the British Museum. It has a portion of the wooden shaft inside, which appears to be of beech. The hole for the pin is still visible in the wood, but the pin has perished. It may have been made of horn.

Fig. 424 is on the scale of one-fourth, the original being 14 inches long. It was found with eleven others, varying in length from 10 to 16 inches, and with spear-heads and other articles, at Guilsfield, Montgomeryshire.[1302]

Another ferrule (9½ inches) was found, with spear-heads, socketed celts, &c., near Nottingham.[1303]

Four such (about 7 inches) were found, with spear-heads, &c., at Bloody Pool, South Brent, Devon.[1304]

Canon Greenwell has a specimen from Antrim (9½ inches), the end of which is worn obliquely, as if by trailing on the ground. It has a single rivet-hole.

A very long ferrule of this kind (14½ inches), but with a small disc at the base, is in the Museum at Nantes. It was found in the bed of the Loire.

A shorter form, somewhat expanding towards the base, is shown in Fig. 425. This, together with three others, none more than 4¼ inches long, was found, with spear-heads, &c., at Pant-y-maen, near Glancych.[1305]

In the Broadward find[1306] were six tubes, varying in length from 6 to 2 inches, of which one only was of this type. Some were so small that the diameter did not exceed ¼ inch.

A small ferrule of this kind was in the hoard found at Beddington, near Croydon,[1307] and part of one in that of Wickham Park. The latter is now in the British Museum.

What appears to be a ferrule of this kind, but more widely expanded at the end, like Fig. 425, is described in Gordon’s “Itinerarium Septentrionale”[1308] as “a Roman tuba, or trumpet.”

Another of these expanded ferrules is in the Museum of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society.[1309]

In the Fulbourn find[1310] there were two ferrules expanding at the base to about 2 inches in diameter, which were regarded by Dr. Clarke as having been the feet of two spears. He points out that similar feet for spears may be seen represented on Greek vases.[1311] The οὐρίαχος or σαυρωτήρ of Homer[1312] appears to have been more susceptible of being driven into the ground. This point at the base was sometimes used for fighting when the spear-head proper was broken.

Among the African tribes on the shores of the Gambia, the spears, as Mr. Syer Cuming[1313] has pointed out, have a chisel- or celt-like ferrule at the base of their shafts; and this fashion extends all across Africa to Madagascar,[1314] and recurs in Borneo.

Some Danish ferrules[1315] present the same peculiarity of being chisel-like at the base.

Another form, more spherical at the base, is shown in Fig. 427, copied from the Archæological Journal.[1316] The original, with several others, was found at St. Margaret’s Park, Hereford. The socket tapers to a point 1½ inches from the extremity.

A nearly similar ferrule, but with a slight cylindrical projection beyond the spherical part, was found with other bronze objects at Lanant, Cornwall.[1317] A kind of pointed ferrule of a nearly square section, with the faces hollowed, which was found near Windsor,[1318] and is now in the British Museum, not improbably belongs to a later date than the Bronze Period.

In the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy are several ferrules, apparently for the end of spear shafts, some of which are said to have been found with spear-heads. Many of these have ornaments of a late Celtic[1319] character upon them. Others[1320] appear to have been made from plates turned over and soldered, and not to have been cast hollow. Both of these kinds are of more recent date than the Bronze Age.

Tapering ferrules of bronze occur in Italy, and a pointed iron ferrule, probably belonging to a barbed javelin of Roman age, was found in the river Witham, near Lincoln.[1321]

A ferrule, about 3 inches long, with parallel lines engraved round it, is in the Museum at Clermont Ferrand. Another, more conical, is in that of Narbonne.[1322] Some with expanded button-like ends have been found in the Lake-dwellings of Savoy. Several ferrules, some of them very short, were found with bronze spear-heads at Alise Ste. Reine (Côte d’Or).[1323]

Others, some of them ornamented, formed part of the great Bologna hoard.

A ferrule was found with a bronze spear-head, between 23 and 24 inches long, in the Alban Necropolis, and is figured in the Archæologia.[1324] Padre Garrucci regards this spear as neither Greek, nor Etruscan, nor Latin, but Celtic.

Although the simple leaf-shaped spear-heads from the British Isles present close analogies with those from the other parts of Europe, yet for the most part those of the other types, with loops to the sockets, with openings in the blade, or of the barbed class last described, present peculiarities of their own. Several of these types appear, indeed, to have been evolved in Britain or in Ireland, and the differences they exhibit from the ordinary continental types are more marked than in any other class of bronze weapons. Though loops are such a common adjunct to the socketed celts of other countries, yet looped palstaves are comparatively rare abroad. At the same time, as will have been seen, hardly any examples of looped spear-heads from foreign countries can be cited, while in Britain, and more especially in Ireland, they are very abundant. This fact, in whatever way it is to be accounted for, affords a most conclusive argument against assigning a Roman origin for our bronze weapons; a looped spear-head, so far as I am aware, never having been discovered in Italy, and but very rarely even in Gaul. The spear-heads with the small apertures in the blade appear also to be of an indigenous type.

Some of the iron spear-heads from Hallstatt and elsewhere have been made in imitation of those in bronze, and have been welded along the whole length of their sockets in a manner which displays the highest skill in the smiths. But, unlike the iron palstaves and socketed celts, none of the spear-heads are provided with a loop. In later times the sockets of the iron spear-heads were left with an open slit along them, a method of manufacture which produced an equally serviceable weapon, and involved far less trouble.

As to the position in time which spear-heads occupy in the Bronze Age, it is probable that it is towards the close rather than the beginning of that period. Not only are spear-heads almost, if not quite, absent from our barrows, but the skill involved in producing implements so thin and so truly cored could only have been acquired after long practice in casting. The objects to be considered in the next chapter are also of comparatively late date.

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XV. SHIELDS, BUCKLERS, AND HELMETS

HAVING now described the various weapons of offence of which in early times bronze formed the material, it will be well to examine the arms of defence fabricated from the same metal, and presumably of the same or nearly the same age.

The shields first in use in Britain were probably formed of perishable materials, such as wicker-work, wood, or hide, like those of many savage tribes of the present day; and it can only have been after a long acquaintance with the use of bronze that plates could have been produced of such size as those with which some of the ancient shields and bucklers found in this country were covered. They would appear, therefore, to belong to quite the close of the Bronze Age, if not to the transitional period when iron was coming into use. There are, indeed, several bronze coverings of shields of elongated form, such as those from the river Witham[1325] and from the Thames,[1326] with decorations upon them, in which red enamel plays a part, that have been found associated with the iron swords of what Mr. Franks has termed the Late Celtic Period. Those, however, which appear to have a better claim to a place in these pages are of a circular form.

That which I have shown in Fig. 428 is now in the British Museum, and has already been figured in the Archæologia[1327], and described by Mr. Gage. It was dredged up from what appears to have been the ancient bed of the river Isis, near Little Wittenham, Berks, not far from the Dyke Hills, near Dorchester, Oxon. It is about 13½ inches diameter, not quite circular in form, though probably intended so to be. The raised bosses have all been wrought in the metal with the exception of four, two of which form the rivets for the handle across the umbo, and two others serve as the rivets or pivots for two small straps or buttons of bronze on the inner side of the buckler. Such buttons occur on several other examples, but it is difficult to determine the exact purpose which they served. From the pains taken in this instance to conceal the heads of these pivots on the outside, by making them take the form and place of bosses, it would appear that they were necessary adjuncts of the shield, and possibly in some way connected with a lining for it.

Such a lining can hardly have been of wood, or many rivet or pin holes would have been necessary for securing the metal to it. It may be that a lining of hide was moulded while wet to the form of the shield, and that these buttons served to keep it in place when dry. In one case[1328] it is said that some fibrous particles resembling leather still remain attached to the inside of the shield. In general the metal is so thin that without some lining these bucklers would have afforded but a poor defence against the stroke of a sword, spear, or arrow. In this Little Wittenham example, and possibly in some others, it is probable that the shield itself was larger than the bronze plate. Another view is that these buttons fastened a strap for carrying the shield when either in or out of use.

Another buckler, in Lord Londesborough’s collection, 14 inches in diameter, with two circles of small bosses divided by a raised band, is stated to have been found with a large bronze spear-head at Athenry,[1329] Co. Galway. Two of the bosses of the inner circle are the heads of rivets for securing the handle. A much smaller buckler, or centre of a buckler, only 9¼ inches in diameter (also with two rings of bosses), presumably found in the Isis,[1330] near Eynsham Bridge, is in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries. It has a slightly conical boss, surrounded by a circle of smaller bosses between two raised ribs. There is also a raised rib round the margin formed by turning over the metal towards the outer face. In the outer ring of bosses two are missing at the places where, no doubt, were formerly the rivets of the buttons or loops.

A shield in the British Museum (21 inches), found in the Thames, has four rows of bosses, about an inch in diameter, and the same number of raised rings. The inner set of bosses abuts on the umbo. There is a marginal rim about an inch beyond the outer ring. This shield appears to have had two buttons, which as usual are nearly in a line with one of the rivets which fasten the handle. One of these loops remains secured by a large-headed rivet matching the bosses. There is at least one hole through the shield which may have resulted from a spear thrust.

The rivets which secure the handle have heads made in imitation of bosses.

In some the decoration consists of a series of concentric ribs or beads, as in that found in a peat moss near Harlech,[1331] which is shown in Fig. 429. Its diameter is 22 inches. The heads of the four rivets for holding the handle and the two buttons are in this case visible in the spaces between the ribs.

Another of the same pattern was discovered in company with that shown in Fig. 430, in Coveney Fen,[1332] near Ely, and is now in the Museum of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society. The metal of which it is formed has been found on analysis to contain—

Copper 87·55 Tin 11·72 Nickel 0·40 ————— 99·67

The presence of the nickel is probably due to impurities in the ore from which the copper was extracted.

The second Coveney shield is shown in Fig. 430.[1333] The ornament in this instance is of a very peculiar character, and appears to represent two snakes, one long and the other short, twisted about into a symmetrical pattern. They are of the amphisbæna kind, with a head at each end. The two outermost ribs, one of them at the margin, are continuous. The rivets for holding the handle are visible, as are also three on either side connected with the inner buttons, that in this case have been regarded as loops by which the shield was suspended.

The buttons have a small hole through them, as will be seen by Fig. 431. In front of each is a pair of small conical studs, of which the purpose can now hardly be determined. Mr. Goodwin thought that they might be intended to prevent a thong which passed beneath the buttons from slipping away from them.

The type of shield, of which, the largest number has been found in the British Isles, is that having a series of concentric rings, from about twelve to thirty in number, and between them circles of small studs.

A very fine example of this kind of shield is preserved in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of London,[1334] and is shown on the scale of one-sixth, together with some of its details on a larger scale, in Figs. 432, 433, and 434, for the use of which I am indebted to the Council of the Ayrshire and Wigtonshire Archæological Association.[1335]

A figure of the shield has been given by Professor Daniel Wilson,[1336] but the illustrations here given will convey a much more accurate impression of its character and details.

Though there is some discrepancy as to measurement, there is little doubt that this is the shield found about the year 1780 in a peat moss on a farm called Luggtonrigge, in the parish of Beith, Ayrshire, and presented to the Society of Antiquaries by Dr. Ferris,[1337] who was informed that four or five others of the same kind were discovered at the same time. A portion of the margin of the shield is shown of the full size in Fig. 433, and the handle across the inner side of the boss on the scale of one-half in Fig. 434. These figures give so complete an idea of the original that it seems needless to enter into further details. It is, however, well to call attention to the fact that the handle of the buckler, which is made from a flat piece of bronze, is rendered more convenient to grasp, and at the same time strengthened, by its sides being doubled over, and thus made to present a rounded edge. It is secured to the shield by a rivet at each end. About midway between the edge of the umbo and that of the shield, but placed so that one of the rivets of the handle is in the same line and midway between them, have been two rivets, each fastening a short button like those on the Coveney Fen shield, of which at present only one remains. The rivet-hole for the other has been closed by a short rivet.

Other shields, almost identical in character, have likewise been found in Scotland, one of which, by the kindness of the Council of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, is shown in Fig. 435, on the scale of one-sixth. A portion of the margin is shown full size in Fig. 436, and the interior of the umbo in Fig. 437, on the scale of one-fourth. It was found in 1837, together with another, in a marshy field near Yetholm, Roxburghshire. These shields have been described in a paper by the late Mr. W. T. M^cCulloch,[1338] of some of whose references I have here made use.

One of these Yetholm shields is 23½ inches in diameter, and has thirty concentric rings of convex knobs alternating with projecting circular ribs or beads; the other measures 24 inches across, and has twenty-four rings of both knobs and ribs. In the centre of each is a hollow circular umbo 4 inches in diameter, with a handle riveted across it.

Another shield of the same character was found at Yetholm[1339] in 1870, near the place where the two others were discovered. It is 22½ inches in diameter, with twenty-nine concentric rings alternating with the usual small knobs. The boss is 3½ inches in diameter.

At the back of each of these shields, about midway between the centre and the rim, are the usual small movable tongues of bronze, which have been supposed to serve for the attachment of a leather strap by which the shield might be slung round the body. Mr. Jeffrey, F.S.A. Scotland, of Jedburgh, who described this third shield, has pointed out that there is too little room beneath the tongues for a strap of any kind.

So far as at present known these are the only instances of bucklers of this kind having been discovered in Scotland.

In England and Wales several such have been found. One was in the Meyrick Collection[1340] at Goodrich Court, and is now in the British Museum. It is about 26½ inches in diameter, with twenty concentric circles of knobs and ribs between, and is in all respects like those just described. It was found about 1804 in a turbary near Aberystwith, Cardiganshire. It has had the usual buttons, one of which remains.

Another example[1341] of the kind (25¼ inches), with twenty-seven concentric rings, was also in the Meyrick Collection, and is now in the British Museum. It was found in a peat moss at Moel Sinbod, near Capel Curig, Carnarvonshire. It has one of the usual loops and the rivet of the other. Sir Samuel Meyrick had heard of another shield, dug up near Newcastle-on-Tyne, which the owner, wishing to gratify all his friends, cut up like a cake, and sent to each a slice. This may be the shield found at Broomyholme, Chester-le-Street, Durham, of which a fragment is in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle-on-Tyne.

Another now in the possession of Sir Edward Blackett, Bart., was found near Corbridge, Northumberland.

Fragments[1342] of two other shields of the same character were also found in Northumberland, at Ingoe, in the parish of Stamfordham, about two miles north of the Roman wall. They were originally about 20 inches in diameter, and like so many others were discovered during draining operations.

Another buckler of the same character was found in the Thames[1343] at London, and passed into the British Museum with the Roach Smith Collection. This specimen is 21¼ inches in diameter, and has eleven rings of the small bosses upon it separated by concentric ribs. A curious feature in this shield is that the places to which the usual little buttons were attached have been neatly cut out, leaving triangular holes. There is also a third hole of the same kind. In one place also there is a hole through the shield, such as might have been produced by the thrust of a bronze spear. Close by this hole is a clean cut, such as might have been made by a sword. The plate of bronze has been turned over on to the face, so as to form the outer rim.

A circular shield,[1344] with twenty-six concentric rings of studs, was dredged up, together with a leaf-shaped bronze sword, from the bed of the Thames off Woolwich in 1830.

A thin bronze plate from the Thames, 19 inches in diameter, convex, and with small knobs round the margin, is in the Mayer Collection at Liverpool. It has been marked with the hammer, possibly in imitation of basket-work, and has been mended in one place in ancient times. It may be the bottom of a caldron, and not a shield.

Another buckler, 26 inches in diameter, having twelve concentric raised rings with the usual knobs between them, is also said to have been found in the Thames[1345] between Hampton and Walton, in September, 1864.

In draining a meadow at Bagley,[1346] about five miles from Ellesmere, in Shropshire, another of these circular bucklers was found. This is 23 inches in diameter, with an umbo of 4 inches, and has twenty-six concentric circles, with the same rings of knobs between them as on the other examples. It has the usual holes for the rivets of the small buttons.

Another, found on Burringham Common,[1347] Lincolnshire, in 1843, is 26 inches in diameter, with an umbo of 4½ inches, and only nineteen concentric circles with intermediate rings of knobs. The boss of this shield is conical rather than hemispherical. It is now in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy. A shield of this kind 20½ inches in diameter, having thirteen concentric circles of small bosses and raised rings between, was found at Sutton St. Michael’s, Norfolk.[1348]

In the collection of Canon Greenwell is the bronze boss of a shield nearly 5 inches in diameter, probably intended for the centre of a wooden buckler. It has three small holes for nails or rivets in the rim. In one place there is a square hole, apparently made by a thrust from a spear. This boss was found at Harwood, Northumberland.

Shields like Fig. 435, with several concentric rings alternating with small knobs, are rare, but by no means unknown in Ireland. One (27¾ inches in diameter) was found in a bog near Ballynamona,[1349] Co. Limerick, and has been figured. As usual, it has the two movable loops or buttons at the back. There is a little patch of bronze over a small irregular hole in the shield, such as an arrow or a javelin would make. It is soldered on with a metal which is stated to be bronze, but which I imagine must be some more fusible alloy of copper. This shield is now in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, and in their Proceedings[1350] is stated to have been found in Lough Gur, Co. Limerick, but this must be an error.

The central portion of a bronze shield, including the umbo, was found at Toome Bar, Lough Neagh, and is now in the collection of Mr. William Gray, of Belfast.

A somewhat doubtful instance has been recorded of the remains of a bronze shield having been found with an interment in a barrow. Sir R. Colt Hoare, in his examination of the Bush Barrow, Normanton,[1351] found a skeleton lying from S. to N., and about eighteen inches S. of the head “several brass rivets intermixed with wood, and some thin bits of brass nearly decomposed. These articles covered a space of twelve inches or more; it is probable, therefore, that they are the mouldered remains of a shield.” Near the shoulders lay a flanged bronze celt like Fig. 9. A large dagger of bronze, and what Sir Richard calls a spear-head of the same metal, but which was probably a dagger, the inlaid hilt (Fig. 289). a stone hammer, and some plates of gold accompanied this interment. It is much to be regretted that more is not known of the real character of the object with the rivets, but their presence shows that it could not have been a shield such as those here described, in which the only rivets are those securing the handle and the movable buttons.

The umbo of a Late-Celtic shield was among the objects found at Polden Hill,[1352] Somersetshire.

Some wooden bucklers have been found both in Scotland[1353] and Ireland, but it is hard to determine their age.

Mr. Franks[1354] has already remarked that bronze shields are of far less common occurrence on the Continent than in the British Isles. He cites three from the Copenhagen Museum,[1355] one of which, about 27 inches in diameter, has five concentric ribs round the boss and ten sets of knobs; these, however, are arranged in such a manner as to leave a star of eight rays of smooth metal radiating from the boss. The other two are less like the British in character. A fine shield in the Stockholm Museum, with swan-like figures upon it, has been thought to have been imported from Italy.[1356]

One found near Bingen, on the Rhine,[1357] about 15½ inches in diameter, has merely four raised concentric ribs. There are two small bowed handles secured with two rivets, each in about the same position as the usual button. They seem certainly intended for a strap to pass through them. There are, however, two other rivets in the shield to which movable buttons may possibly have been attached.

The Italian shields mentioned by Mr. Franks are of a different type. One in the British Museum (34 inches in diameter) has a very slight boss, and is ornamented with concentric bands of sphinxes and other designs.

As has already been observed, it is somewhat hard to judge of the date of these bucklers. I am not aware of any portions of them having been found in the hoards of metal in which fragments of swords frequently occur. Still in the case of the shield dredged up off Woolwich the sword which accompanied it was of bronze, though of course there is no evidence of the two having been lost or deposited together. The whole character, however, of the ornamentation and workmanship is, I think, more in accordance with the Bronze Age than with the Late Celtic or Early Iron Period, though the shields probably belong to the close of the Bronze Period.

Circular bucklers, or targets, no doubt remained in use until a considerably later date, but it seems probable that some other material than a thin plate of bronze was used for their manufacture. Professor Daniel Wilson[1358] remarks that on the gold coins of Tasciovanus, Cunobeline, and others of our native rulers contemporary with the first intercourse with Rome, the shields borne by the warriors are either long and double-pointed, or, if round, large and disked, and of very different construction from the Luggtonrigge shield. On one coin of Cunobeline, however (Evans, pl. xii. 14), the horseman bears a circular buckler, which, so far as can be judged from so diminutive a representation as that given on the coin, would be about 2 feet in diameter. On two small gold coins of Verica,[1359] recently published, the horseman carries a target of somewhat larger proportions. Somewhat smaller circular bucklers are carried by the horsemen on certain Spanish coins,[1360] probably of the second century B.C. One of these shields shows four smaller bosses, arranged in cruciform order around the central boss; another seems to be plain except the umbo and a projecting rim.

This buckler is no doubt the Cetra, or Cætra (καίτρεα, Hesych.), in use among the people of Spain and Mauretania, which was usually made of hide, among the latter people sometimes of that of the elephant. Cæsar[1361] speaks of the “cetratæ Hispaniæ cohortes,” and Tacitus[1362] mentions the Britons as armed “ingentibus gladiis sine mucrone et brevibus cetris.” It does not appear that the Romans ever carried the cetra, which has been by Livy compared to the pelta of the Greeks and Macedonians.[1363] The clipeus appears to have been larger in size, and to have been held on the arm and not by the handle only.

But whatever shields may have been in use in this country at the time of the Roman invasion, I am inclined to refer these circular bucklers to a somewhat earlier date, as already in Cæsar’s time iron was fully in use for swords and for cutting purposes generally; and, as has already been observed, the shields with which the early iron swords are found are of a different form from these. As is the case with bronze swords, such bucklers are never found with interments, and those discovered seem to have been lost in the water, or hidden in bogs, rather than buried as accessories for the dead.

The skill requisite for the production of such bucklers must have been great, and the appliances at command by no means contemptible. The whole of the work is repoussé and wrought with the hammer, and not improbably the original sheet of bronze from which a shield was made was considerably less in diameter and also much thicker than the finished shield. To produce so large a casting of such even substance, and yet so thin, would I think be beyond the skill of most modern, and probably most ancient, brass-founders; and moreover there is no appearance on the shields, of the metal having been cast in the form in which it now appears.

While still upon the subject of defensive armour it will be well to say a few words about bronze helmets, though there is good reason to believe that in this country at all events such objects do not belong to the Bronze Age properly so-called. Indeed the earliest known bronze helmets in some other countries, such as those from Assyria and Etruria, appear to belong to a time when iron was already in use in those countries. The date of an Etruscan helmet of bronze preserved in the British Museum[1364] can be determined with precision, for an inscription upon it proves that it was offered in the Temple of Zeus at Elis, by Hiero, Tyrant of Syracuse, from the spoils of the Etruscans after the naval battle of Cumæ, which took place in B.C. 474. It is of simple form with a brim around it. Those which have been found in Styria and Germany[1365] are in some cases half ovals in form, sometimes with a knob at the top, without any rims round the opening, but with a certain number of small holes for the attachment of cheek-pieces or appendages of other kinds. These may belong to a true Bronze Period. Others, like those from Hallstatt,[1366] have rims and even ridges for crests.

In the Salzburg Museum is a fine helmet without a rim, but with an ornamented ridge and cheek-pieces. It was found, with twelve others now at Vienna, at Mattrey,[1367] between Innsbruck and Brixen. One of these bears an Etruscan inscription upon it. According to Pliny, “the ancient inhabitants of Brixen came from Etruria.”

Even in the time of Severus, the Britons, according to Herodian,[1368] made no use of helmets or cuirasses, though they wore an iron collar round the neck and an iron belt round the body, and regarded them as ornaments and signs of wealth.

The following English and French helmets of bronze may just be mentioned.

(1.) A helmet of hemispherical form tapering to a projection, pierced above to receive a crest or ornament, the extreme height being about 8½ inches, and the diameter at the base nearly the same. This was found in Moorgate Street, London.[1369]

(2.) One found in the Thames,[1370] near Waterloo Bridge, with projecting horns and ornamented with scroll-work and red enamel. This is undoubtedly of the Late Celtic Period. Some Etruscan helmets also bear horns, but more curved in form than those on this helmet from the Thames.

(3.) Another, more conical in form, and with a semicircular plate at the back, locality unknown, but probably from a river.[1371] This was in the Meyrick Collection, and is now in the British Museum.

The helmets found on Ogmore Down,[1372] Glamorganshire, appear to be of much later date.

A helmet from Auxonne, Côte d’Or, has been figured by Chantre.[1373] Another was found with various bronze antiquities at Theil[1374] (Loir et Cher).

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XVI. TRUMPETS AND BELLS

ANOTHER instrument probably connected with warfare, though not strictly speaking an arm either of offence or defence, is the trumpet, of which numerous examples in bronze have been found, especially in Ireland. It is very doubtful whether the greater part of them do not belong to the Early Iron Age, rather than to that of Bronze; but as it seems probable that some at least belong to a transitional period, and it is possible that others are of even earlier date, they could hardly be passed over without notice in these pages.

There are two distinct classes of these instruments, so far as the process of their manufacture is concerned, viz. those which are cast in one piece, and those which are formed of sheet-metal turned over and riveted to form the tube. There are also two distinct varieties of the instrument, viz. those in which the aperture for blowing is at the end, and those in which it is at the side.

Sir W. Wilde, in his Catalogue[1375] of the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, has devoted several pages to a detailed description of the trumpets found in Ireland, to which the reader is referred. Those which he figures are all curved, some almost to a semicircle, others to a more irregular sweep. Some straight tubes which were found in company with several curved horns he has regarded, but without sufficient cause, as the portions of a “commander’s staff,” or of the handle of a halberd. One of these is shown in Fig. 438, borrowed from his Catalogue.[1376] A similar straight tube, (23¾ inches,) found with trumpets at Dunmanway, Co. Cork, is now in the British Museum. The earliest known instance of the discovery of such instruments is, according to Wilde, that recorded by Sir Thomas Molyneux,[1377] in 1725, of a “short side-mouthed trumpet” being found with others in a mound near Carrickfergus, which was then regarded as of Danish origin. But so early as 1713 Mr. F. Nevill described eight bronze trumpets found at Dungannon,[1378] Co. Tyrone. In 1750 thirteen or fourteen more curved bronze horns were discovered between Cork and Mallow, three of which are described and figured in the “Vetusta Monumenta.”[1379]

There is a remarkable resemblance between these trumpets and three of those found near Chute Hall, Tralee, Co. Kerry, and described by Mr. Robert Day, F.S.A., in the Journal of the Royal Historical and Archæological Association of Ireland.[1380] By his kindness I am able here to reproduce his cuts as Figs. 439, 440, and 441. It will be observed that in two of them the ends are open, so as to be adapted for the reception of mouth-pieces, and that the end of the other is closed. In this there is a lateral opening to which to apply the mouth. It is on the inner curve of the trumpet, but in some other cases it is at the side. As Mr. Day has observed, there are rivet-holes at the wide ends of two of the horns, as if for securing some more widely expanding end, while in the more bell-mouthed examples no such rivet-holes are present. The trumpet shown in Fig. 440 is made of two pieces which fit exactly into each other, one of them being nearly straight. The length of this instrument, taken along the external curve, is 50 inches, and its bell-shaped mouth is 4 inches in diameter. It will be seen that at the mouths, and in other positions on these three trumpets, there are small conical projections or spikes always in groups of four. Mr. Day has suggested the possibility of these being added to give effect to blows with the trumpets in case it became necessary to use them as weapons of offence. He has also pointed out the remarkable resemblance between the horns with the lateral openings and the war trumpets in use in Central Africa, which are made from elephants’ tusks. One of these is shown in Fig. 442, also kindly lent by Mr. Day. The conch-shell trumpets of Fiji have also lateral openings.

As will subsequently be seen, trumpets of the two types represented by Figs. 439 and 440 have been found associated with bronze weapons.

To return to the trumpets from Cork described in the “Vetusta Monumenta.” Two of these are formed, like Fig. 440, of two pieces, and are open at the end, which may have been provided with some kind of mouth-piece. The other, like Fig. 439, is cast in a single piece and is closed at the small end, but has a large orifice at the side like the Portglenone specimen Fig. 444. Both are provided with a number of conical projections by way of ornament round the mouth, and one of them has similar small spikes in other positions. With them were found some pieces of straight tubing, which were also decorated in a similar manner. The horn with the side aperture is provided with a ring for suspension, like Fig. 439. Some of the straight tubes have a sliding ferrule upon them also furnished with a ring.

Sir W. Wilde observes of a horn about 24 inches long with the aperture at the end slightly everted, as if for holding the lips, that it requires a great exertion even to produce a dull sound with this instrument. As to those with lateral apertures 2 inches long on the average, and 1¼ inches wide, he says that “it is not possible by any yet discovered method of placing the lips to this mouth-hole to produce a musical sound; but, as conjectured by Walker in 1786, these instruments might have been used as speaking-trumpets, to convey the voice to a great distance as well as render it much louder.”

In one instance of a trumpet, like Fig. 439, being broken across the mouth-piece, it has been repaired by a process of burning together, like that adopted in the case of broken swords[1381] previously mentioned. The mended portion is shown in Fig. 443,[1382] borrowed from Wilde. This trumpet was found at Derrynane, Co. Kerry.

A trumpet, broken across the middle and mended in a similar manner, formed part of the “Dowris find,” from which a number of specimens are preserved in the British Museum,[1383] and others are in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy. The metal of which most of the articles in this hoard are formed has a peculiar golden lustre which is thought to arise from the admixture of a certain proportion of lead. A horn analyzed by Donovan[1384] gave:

Copper 79·34 Tin 10·87 Lead 9·11 ——— 99·32

The find took place at Dowris, near Parsonstown, in King’s County, and comprised, besides trumpets and socketed celts, a casting for a hammer-head, a socketed knife, tanged knives, razors, a broad rapier-shaped dagger-blade, broken swords, a dagger formed from a part of a sword, spear-heads both leaf-shaped and with openings in the blade, vessels of thin bronze, rough metal, some rattles or crotals, such as will shortly be mentioned, a pin with a hook somewhat like a crochet-needle, and some rubbing stones for grinding and polishing. There may have been other articles, but those here mentioned are represented in the portion of the hoard now in the British Museum. The association of trumpets with such a series raises the presumption that some of them at least belong to the close of the Bronze Age proper.

Some of these Dowris trumpets are engraved in the “Horæ Ferales,”[1385] and one of them belonging to the Earl of Rosse is peculiar as having two loops opposite each other above and below. A detached portion of another consists of a nearly straight tube, 9 inches long, expanding at each end.

Another slightly differing example with the opening at the side is also figured by Mr. R. Day, and here with his permission reproduced. It was found at Portglenone, Co. Derry, and measures 24½ inches along the convex margin.

The other finds of trumpets have been for the most part isolated. Most of those I am about to cite have already been mentioned by Wilde. A fine specimen, like Fig. 444, is figured by Vallancey[1386] and in Gough’s “Camden’s Britannia.”[1387] Three others and a portion of a straight tube were found in the county of Limerick[1388] in 1787. Others have been found near Killarney;[1389] Cornaconway, Co. Cavan; Kilraughts, Co. Antrim; Diamond Hill, Killeshandra; Crookstown and Dunmanway, Co. Cork.

As the riveted variety of trumpet appears from its ornamentation to belong to the Late Celtic Period, a short mention of it will suffice. One[1390] found near Armagh, and now in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, has at the end a disc 7½ inches in diameter, embossed with the peculiar scroll patterns characteristic of that period.

Another is no less than 8 feet 5 inches along the convex margin, and consists of two portions made of sheet bronze, each turned over to form a tube, and having the abutting edges riveted to a long strip of metal extending along the interior of the tube. This strip of bronze is only half an inch in width, and has two rows of minute rivet-holes in it, the rivets being placed alternately. Their circular heads are on the inside of the tube, and so minute are the rivets, that there are no less than 638 of them along the seam. It is, indeed, not unlike a modern riveted hose pipe of leather. In what manner such an ingenious and complicated piece of riveting could have been effected is, as Sir W. Wilde remarks, a subject for speculation.

These riveted trumpets appear to be unknown in Britain, and the cast-bronze variety is extremely scarce. A fine and perfect specimen found at Caprington, Ayrshire, has been engraved for the Ayrshire and Wigtonshire Archæological Association,[1391] and is here, by the kindness of the Council of the Association, reproduced as Fig. 445. It was found some time before 1654, on the estate of Coilsfield, in the parish of Tarbolton, in Kyle, but is known as the Caprington horn. According to Mr. R. W. Cochran-Patrick, F.S.A., it has been described by Sir Robert Gordon in Blaeuw’s Atlas[1392] and by Defoe.[1393] This horn is 25 inches in length, and is the only specimen recorded to have been found in Scotland. The metal of which it is formed has been analyzed by Professor Stevenson Macadam, and consists of—

Copper 90·26 Tin 9·61 Loss ·13 ——— 100·00

English trumpets of bronze are of extremely rare occurrence. One found in the river Witham, Lincolnshire, has been figured in the Philosophical Transactions,[1394] and is nearly straight for the greater part of its length (about 28 inches), curving upwards near the end into an irregularly-shaped expanding mouth. It has an ornament or crest like a mane along the exterior curve. In form it is not unlike the carnyx which is brandished by the horseman on the coins of the British princes Eppillus and Tasciovanus,[1395] and which also appears on some Roman coins and monuments commemorative of Gallic and British victories. The metal on analysis gave copper 88, tin 12, and the tube was formed from a hammered sheet and soldered with tin. It not improbably belongs to a period not far removed from that of the Roman invasion of this country.

Another, with two joints and a perfect mouth-piece, is said to have been found at Battle, Sussex, and has been engraved by Grose.[1396] A bronze horn about 3 feet 7 inches long, found in Mecklenburg,[1397] is not unlike the Scotch horn in character, though smaller at the wide end. The curved bronze horns or “lurer,” found in Denmark,[1398] have usually broad bossed flanges at the wide end, and most resemble the Irish Late Celtic trumpets.

The use of war trumpets among the Celtic population of Western Europe has been more than once mentioned by classical writers, and passages from them have been cited by Mr. Franks and others. Polybius[1399] speaks of the innumerable trumpeters in the army of the Celts, and Diodorus Siculus[1400] says of the Gauls that they have barbaric trumpets of a special nature which emit a hoarse sound well suited to the din of battle. The Roman lituus in use for cavalry seems to have been of much the same shape as the carnyx, the end of which latter was in some cases made to resemble a fanciful head of an animal. The continuance of the same character of instrument into the Early Iron Age, and the advanced art shown in producing such castings as the trumpets from Dowris and elsewhere, go to prove that they must belong to the close of the Bronze Period, if, indeed, some may not more probably be placed in a period of transition from Bronze to Iron.

Another form of instrument intended for producing sound, if not indeed deserving to be classed as a musical instrument, is the bell, or rattle, formed of a hollow egg-shaped or pear-shaped piece of bronze, with a pebble or piece of metal inside by way of clapper.

The only examples which I am able to adduce are those which formed part of the Dowris hoard, one of which is represented in Fig. 446.[1401] There are three such in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, and four in the British Museum. With the latter is a smaller plain bell of the same character and two unfinished castings. Sir W. Wilde observes that in casting, the metal appears to have been poured into the mould by an aperture at the side, through which the core of clay that contained the metal clapper was broken up. The mould was in two halves, and the rings and staples at the ends were cast together. In the perfect examples at the British Museum, the sides of the holes by which the core was extracted have been hammered together so as in some cases to be almost closed. In one instance there is some appearance of the sides having been brazed together.

The sound emitted by these bells is dull and feeble. Like the modern horse bells, a number of them may have been hung together, and not improbably employed in a similar manner to attract the attention both of the eye and ear.

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XVII. PINS

PINS for the purpose of fastening the dress or the hair seem to have been in use from very early times. Made of bone,[1402] they have been found associated with polished stone implements, and pins of the same material are of extremely common occurrence with Roman remains, and are not unknown at the present day. In the same manner, pins of bronze or of brass have remained in use ever since their first introduction during the Bronze Period, and it is, therefore, by no means easy, and, indeed, often absolutely impossible, to assign a date with any degree of confidence to such objects when found by themselves, and not in association with other remains of which the antiquity can be more readily determined. In the case of small or imperfect pins there is considerable difficulty in distinguishing them from awls, such as have already been described in Chapter VII. In other cases, it is often difficult to say whether bronze pins, certainly of great antiquity, are to be assigned to the Bronze Period properly so called, or the Late Celtic or Early Iron Period.

In describing the objects of this class, it will, perhaps, be best to take first such examples as have been found in the exploration of tumuli or in direct association with bronze weapons or instruments.

Among the numerous relics found in the Heathery Burn Cave, Durham, were a large number of bronze pins, of which one,[1403] 3⅛ inches long, is shown in Fig. 447. Canon Greenwell has eleven others from 3 inches to 5⅝ inches long, with flat heads, all from this cave, as well as one which has had its end hammered flat, and then turned over into a loop, so as to form the head. A socketed knife and many other objects from this cave have been described in previous pages.

Four imperfect bronze pins, without heads, the longest 3⅞ inches long, were found in the hoard at Marden,[1404] Kent, with a sickle, dagger, and other objects.

What is termed part of a bronze pin, some chipped flints, and long ribbed beads of pottery, were found in the barrow called Matlow Hill,[1405] Cambridgeshire. Another, also fragmentary, was found with a flake of calcined flint, four jet beads, and burnt bones in a barrow on Wykeham Moor,[1406] Yorkshire, by Canon Greenwell. Others are mentioned by Bateman;[1407] but in all these cases, as Canon Greenwell[1408] has pointed out, the presumed pins may have been awls or prickers. The little pin found with a lance-head, a small urn, and some gold ornaments at Upton Lovel,[1409] Wilts, may have been of the same character, as also other pins mentioned by Sir R. Colt Hoare.[1410] A “fine brass pin” is described as having been found with glass, jet, and amber beads, together with burnt bones, in a barrow near Wilsford.[1411] A very fine one in a barrow at Lake,[1412] which, from the engraving, was probably an awl. The long pin with a handle found with a bronze celt and lance-head, or dagger, in a barrow at Abury,[1413] may also have been a tool of that kind. The bronze pins recorded to have been found in a barrow at Bulford,[1414] Wilts, likewise seem to come under this category.

In a barrow at Brigmilston[1415] an interment of burnt bones was accompanied by a pin of twisted bronze, 6 inches long, in the form of a crutch, the head perforated (Fig. 448), a small dagger of bronze, and two whetstones.

A smooth pin of the same character and nearly the same size, but broken, was found in a barrow at Normanton,[1416] in company with burnt bones, two bronze daggers, a whetstone, and a pipe of bone.

The curious pin, with two rings at the head, in each of which is another ring (Fig. 449), was found by Sir R. Colt Hoare in a barrow near Everley. The interment seems to have been in the hollowed trunk of a tree, but the bones were burnt. With them was a dagger with three rivets, and this instrument, which is described as having been in a sheath of wood lined with cloth. Its purpose is difficult to determine.

Another pin (4½ inches), with a bi-lobed head and three perforations, was found with a two-looped palstave and a knife with an interment at Bryn Crûg,[1417] near Carnarvon. It is shown in full size in Fig. 450.

Pins with large rings for their heads have occasionally been found. One such from Taunton,[1418] 7¾ inches, is shown in Fig. 451. It was found with palstaves, a socketed celt, rings, and other objects. The part forming the pin is bent, it would appear intentionally, but for what purpose it is difficult to guess.

Another with a straight pin was found at Chilton Bustle,[1419] Somersetshire. The annular part is divided in the middle, and is flat and thin. It is shown full size in Fig. 452.

Another object of a similar character, but with the ring larger (being oval and 4½ inches by 3 inches) and with the pin part shorter, was found in a barrow between Lewes and Brighton,[1420] with a long pin, to be subsequently mentioned, and a pair of looped bronze bracelets, like Fig. 482. These are now in the museum at Alnwick Castle. Another (6 inches, with ring 2 inches in diameter), probably from a Wiltshire barrow,[1421] is in the collection at Stourhead.

A pin of the same character from the Lake-dwellings of Savoy has been figured by Rabut.[1422]

Another form has a smaller ring at the top, and the pin beneath is usually curved. Fig. 453, from Wilde,[1423] shows an example of this kind. One of the two pins reported to have been found with bronze bridles and buckles of “Late Celtic” character, as well as with a bronze lance-head and socketed celt, at Hagbourn Hill,[1424] Berks, was of this type. The other had a flat head.

I have a pin of the same kind (4¼ inches) found at Holt,[1425] Worcestershire. It has, however, a small cross, formed of five knobs, attached to the front of the ring. It was found in the bed of the Severn, and was presented to me by Mr. G. Edwards, C.E. The pins of this character seem to belong to quite the close of the Bronze Period, if not indeed to the “Late Celtic.”

A much larger form of pin appears, from its style of ornamentation, to belong more truly to the Bronze Period. That shown in Fig. 454 was, indeed, found with a bronze sword, spear-head, and palstave, in the Thames at the mouth of the river Wandle,[1426] Surrey, and is now in the British Museum. It is 7¾ inches in length, and the bulging portion in the centre is pierced probably for some means of attachment. The point, Mr. Franks thinks, was purposely curved. He regards the pin as having been intended to adorn the hair or fasten the dress.

Another pin, of much the same fashion, 12½ inches long, also has the point curved. The bulging portion is in this instance nearer the head, which, moreover, has a piece of amber set in it, and there is a small loop on the side of the pin, as in Fig. 457, instead of a hole through the bulging part. This specimen was found in a mine near the river Fowey,[1427] at a depth of ten fathoms from the surface, when a new work was begun for searching after tin ore.

The long pin already mentioned as found in a barrow near Lewes[1428] has an expanded head with a boss upon it, and about 4 inches below, an ornamented lozenge-shaped plate, beneath which is a small loop for attachment.

Large pins of the same character have been found in the Lake-dwellings of France, Switzerland, and Italy.

A large bronze pin, 13½ inches long, found on Salisbury Plain,[1429] is described as having a flattened head, ornamented on one side with a pattern. This which is now in the British Museum is, however, of the late Celtic Period.

It is by no means impossible that these larger and heavier pins may at times have served as piercing-tools and even as weapons. The stiletto survives as a ladies’ piercing-tool, but no one at the present day would “his quietus make with a bare bodkin;” though there was probably a time when both stiletto and bodkin served a double purpose, and were used, as occasion might require, either as weapons or as tools.

Smaller pins, ornamented at the blunt end, have not unfrequently been found.

A fragment of one discovered by Sir R. Colt Hoare in a barrow at Scratchbury, is engraved in his unpublished plate, and has also been figured by Dr. Thurnam, F.S.A.,[1430] in his memoir so often quoted. It is here reproduced as Fig. 455. Another from a barrow at Camerton,[1431] Somerset, has a hollow spheroidal head, with a double perforation. The head and upper part of the stem are decorated with parallel rings and oblique hatching, as may be seen in Fig. 456. In character this pin much resembles some of those from the Swiss Lake-dwellings.

A very similar pin was obtained from a barrow near Firle,[1432] Sussex, by Dr. Mantell.

A fine pin, nearly 12 inches long, with a head of this shape, was found near Enniskillen. The upper part of the pin is ornamented, with groups of five small beadings round it, and between these are spiral ribs, forming many threaded screws alternately right- and left-handed.[1433]

A long pin from Galway,[1434] of which the lower part is twisted into a spiral, has a head with a notch in it, much like that of a modern screw.

The pins with spherical heads, ornamented by circular holes, with concentric circles around them, so common in the Swiss Lake-dwellings, are as yet unknown in Britain. I have, nevertheless, a portion of what appears to be the large spherical head of a pin, which formed part of the hoard found at Dreuil, near Amiens. Instead of holes, however, it has bosses at intervals, with concentric circles round them. In the spaces between are bands of parallel dotted lines.[1435] Some of the Swiss pins have knobs of tin, or some other metal than bronze, and even red stones inlaid in the perforations, so that not improbably those which now show merely holes in the metal may have been inlaid with horn or some perishable material.

Pins with flat heads, sometimes of large size, are of not unfrequent occurrence, and appear to belong to the Bronze Age.

An Irish example with a small loop at the side is shown in Fig. 457, from a specimen in my own collection. It has apparently at some time been longer. Some German pins[1436] are provided with side loops in the same manner.

A large pin, 8⅛ inches, with the upper part beaded, and with a small side loop, was in the hoard found near Amiens, and is preserved in the museum of that town. With it were socketed celts, a sickle, &c.

A pin of the same general form, but without any loop and with a more ornamental head, also from Ireland, is shown in Fig. 458, and an English example, found near Cambridge, in Fig. 459.

One with a plain flat head, and 11¾ inches long, is figured by Wilde (Fig. 446).

Similar pins with flat heads have been found in the Lake-dwellings of Savoy and Switzerland.

The large flat heads are often highly ornamented.

The pin from Ireland, of which the head is shown in Fig. 460,[1437] one-third of the actual size, is 13½ inches long. This cut and Figs. 453, 462, 463, and 465, are kindly lent by the Royal Irish Academy.

The ornamental expanded heads, which usually have a conical projection in the centre, are more frequently turned over so as to be in the same plane as the pins and be visible when stuck into a garment. Fig. 461 is from a specimen of my own found in the North of Ireland.

Fig. 462, from Wilde,[1438] shows a small pin of the same kind, found at Keelogue Ford.

Occasionally the head seems disproportionately large to the pin.

That of which the highly ornamented head is shown in Fig. 463,[1439] is only 5½ inches long, while the head itself is 2¼ inches in diameter.

A grand pin of this kind from Ireland, with the head 4⅝ inches in diameter, and the pin 10¾ inches long, is in the British Museum. The face of the disc has five concentric circles upon it, with triangles, squares, and ring ornaments between them.

A Scottish specimen of the same character as Fig. 462 (9 inches), found at Tarves, Aberdeenshire, together with bronze swords, is in the same collection. The head is 1⅜ inches in diameter. Another of the same type from Ireland[1440] is said to have had the cone originally gilt.

The head of another, which was found with a number of bronze swords at Edinburgh,[1441] is shown in Fig. 464. This discovery seems to prove that the pins of this type belong to quite the latter part of the Bronze Period.

Pins with flat heads turned over so as to be parallel with their stems are of common occurrence in Denmark.[1442] They are usually ornamented with concentric ribs, and the heads are sometimes plated with gold. The stems are also often decorated.

Another form of pin has a cup-shaped head, not unlike the termination of the large gold clasps, like drawer-handles, so frequently found in Ireland. One of these is shown in Fig. 465, borrowed from Wilde.[1443]

An example of this kind was found in the Heathery Burn Cave. Another pin of this type, 10⅛ inches long, with the cup-shaped head ⅞ inch in diameter and ½ inch deep, with a small cone projecting in the bottom of the cup, was found with a bronze sword and two spear-heads in peat near the Point of Sleat,[1444] Skye.

Sir W. Wilde has given figures of numerous other types of pins, but they nearly all belong to a later period than that of which I am treating. That from a brooch at Bowermadden, Caithness, engraved in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland,[1445] is also of later date. Altogether the subject of pins belonging to the Bronze Age in the British Islands is one of which, in the present state of our knowledge, it is difficult to treat satisfactorily, so few of the more highly developed types having been found in actual association with other bronze relics. In England especially the rarity of bronze pins, as compared, for instance, with their abundance in the Lake-dwellings of Southern Europe, is very striking. As will subsequently be seen, there is nearly as great a scarcity of bracelets and of some other ornaments. It may be that for personal decorations the jet and amber, which during our Bronze Age were so much in fashion for ornaments, suited the native taste better than decorations manufactured from the same metal as that which served for tools and weapons; and that when metal was used gold had the preference. At the same time, for useful articles, such as some kinds of pins, bronze may well have served, and it is to be observed that no pins decorated with gold have as yet been found with bronze weapons in Britain, though they have occurred in other countries.

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Chapter XVIII

TORQUES, BRACELETS, RINGS, EAR-RINGS, AND PERSONAL ORNAMENTS.

ALTHOUGH some of the pins described in the last chapter were destined for ornament rather than for use, they cannot as a class be regarded as purely ornamental. The collars and armlets, to which the present chapter is to be devoted, must, I think, be considered as essentially ornaments, though possibly in some cases affording protection to the neck and arms. The modern epaulette was originally intended for the protection of the shoulder, though now, as a rule, little better than an ornament.

The torque, or torc, takes its name from the Latin torques, which again is derived à torquendo. This word torques was applied to a twisted collar of gold or other metal worn around the neck. Among the ancient Gauls gold torques appear to have been abundant, and to have formed an important part of the spoils acquired from them by their Roman conquerors. About 223 B.C.,[1446] when Flaminius Nepos gained his victory over the Gauls on the Addua, it is related that instead of the Gauls dedicating, as they had intended, a torque made from the spoils of the Roman soldiers to their god of war, Flaminius erected to Jupiter a golden trophy made from the Gaulish torques. The name of the Torquati, a family of the Manlia Gens, was derived from their ancestor, T. Manlius,[1447] having in B.C. 361 slain a gigantic Gaul in single combat, whose torque he took from the dead body after cutting off the head, and placed it around his own neck.

On some of the denarii of the Manlia family[1448] the torque forms a circle round the head of Rome on the obverse. Two interesting papers “On the Torc of the Celts,” by Dr. Samuel Birch, will be found in the Archæological Journal.[1449]

Although these gold torques in many instances undoubtedly belong to the Bronze Period, they are sufficiently well known to antiquaries to render it needless for me here to enter into any minute description of them. The commonest form presents a cruciform section, so that the twist is that of a four-threaded screw, and at either end there is a plain, nearly cylindrical bar, turned back so as to form a kind of hook. I have a fine example of this kind of torque, found with a bronze anvil (Fig. 217) and other bronze instruments and weapons at Fresné la Mère, Calvados. A similar but smaller gold torque was found near Boyton, Suffolk,[1450] which is said to have had the extremities secured together by two small penannular rings of gold, embracing the two terminal hooks.

One 42 inches long was found on Cader Idris;[1451] others in Glamorganshire;[1452] at Pattingham, Staffordshire;[1453] and in several other parts of Britain. Some fine examples of these funicular torques of gold, as well as of other varieties of the same kind of ornament, are in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy at Dublin.[1454]

The torques formed of bronze are, as a rule, thicker and bulkier in their proportions than those of gold, and the ends are usually left straight or but slightly hooked over so as to interlock. They are never provided with the projecting cylindrical ends already mentioned.

The form most frequently discovered in the British Islands is that known as funicular, one of which is shown in Fig. 466, copied from the Archæological Association Journal.[1455]

The original was found with two others at Wedmore, Somersetshire. One of these is of the same type, but of smaller size, and not quite so closely twisted, as shown in Fig. 467; and the other is made of a flat ribbon of metal, ⅜ inch broad, twisted, as shown in Fig. 469, which is copied from the same plate as Figs. 466 and 467.

From another account of these torques,[1456] it appears that they were found near Heath House, in the parish of Wedmore, and that with them were two celts and a few amber beads strung on a wire. This latter, to me, sounds doubtful, as the wire is probably a later addition. The weight of the largest is said to be ½ pound, of the second 2 ounces, and of the smallest 1½ ounce.

Another torque of the character of Fig. 466, about 9 inches in diameter, was found with a bracelet, Fig. 481, and a two-looped palstave, Fig. 87, at West Buckland, Somersetshire,[1457] and is in the collection of Mr. W. A. Sanford. It is shown on the scale of one-third in Fig. 468.

A portion of another torque, but of slender make, was found at Pen Pits,[1458] in the same county; and another, somewhat imperfect, near Edington Burtle.[1459] With the latter was a portion of a ribbon torque like Fig. 469, two bracelets, some rings, and four palstaves.

Two very fine torques, like Fig. 468, 8¾ inches in diameter, were also found in Somersetshire on the Quantock Hills,[1460] in 1794. Within each of them is said to have been placed a looped palstave, like Fig. 77. The weight of one of the torques is reported to have been nearly 2 pounds.

In the collection of the Rev. E. Duke, of Lake House, near Salisbury, are two fine torques of this kind, one large and heavy, and the other smaller and more slender, which were found near Amesbury. With them were several spiral rings closely resembling Fig. 489.

Two others found with armillæ in Dorsetshire[1461] are now in the British Museum. The larger of these is closely twisted, and about 7½ inches in diameter. The smaller is thicker, and shows a coarser twist, and is about 6⅜ inches in diameter. The armillæ are penannular and of rhomboidal section.

Two small torques, some bronze rings or bracelets, and a palstave are recorded to have been dug up in Woolmer Forest, Hants.[1462] Two spiral rings were found with them.

In the collection of Mr. Durden, at Blandford, are several specimens found at Spetisbury, Dorset.[1463]

I have a thin torque about 6¼ inches in diameter, but unfortunately broken, found in Burwell Fen, Cambridgeshire.

In some instances the plain ends of the torque are left without hooks. Such is the case with the fine collar found, with four looped armlets and a palstave without loop, at Hollingbury Hill,[1464] near Brighton, which is now in the British Museum. On each extremity was a spiral ring of bronze, considerably larger than the rod forming the torque, and a third ring is shown in the published drawing. The palstave, which is broken in the middle, apparently on purpose, lay within the circle of the torque, which also was broken across the middle. At regular intervals round it lay the four bracelets, which resemble Fig. 482, and vary somewhat in weight.

The third of the torques already mentioned as found at Wedmore is shown in Fig. 469.

It is of a type which occurs more frequently in gold than in bronze, and in the former metal has often been found in Scotland. Several such were discovered under a large stone at Urquhart, Elginshire. Others have been found at Culter, Lanarkshire;[1465] Belhelvie, Aberdeenshire; Little Lochbroom, Ross-shire; Rannoch, Perthshire; and elsewhere. Some of these are in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh.

There are three or four such in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy.

A gold torque of this class found at Clonmacnoise,[1466] King’s County, has oval balls at each end instead of hooks.

So far as at present known, the funicular torques of bronze are more abundant in the southern and western counties than in the other parts of England. They appear to be unknown both in Scotland and Ireland, though torques of Late Celtic patterns occur in those countries.

The inference is that, although socketed celts are rarely if ever found with them, these twisted neck-rings belong to the close of the Bronze Period, and were introduced into Britain from the Continent. The form is, however, rare in the North of France, and the nearest analogues to the English torques with which we are acquainted are to be seen among those from Northern Germany and Denmark.

The Danish form, with broad expanding ends terminating in spirals, and the derivatives from it in which the spirals are represented by solid cast plates with volutes upon them, are nevertheless unknown in Britain, as is also that with the twist alternately to the right and to the left.

Another form of bronze torque found in Britain is made from a plain piece of wire, hammered out at each end into a broad, nearly quadrangular, plate.

That shown in Fig. 470 lay near the head of a contracted skeleton at Yarnton, four miles from Oxford, at a spot which seems to have been a prehistoric cemetery. I obtained it through the kindness of Professor Rolleston when visiting the place. The ends are ornamented by hammer marking. In a line with the wire forming the torque is a slightly raised flat band perpendicularly fluted; the expanding parts above and below are fluted horizontally. A herald would engrave “azure, a fesse gules” in the same manner, but with the lines much closer together. Two torques of the same character, found at Lumphanan, Aberdeenshire, are in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh.

The form probably belongs to the close of the Bronze Period, if not indeed to the Late Celtic or Early Iron Age.

A torque about 5 inches in diameter, described as of copper, made of a simple wire, with the ends turned back so as to form hooks, and on each a lenticular button of metal, was found near Winslow, Bucks,[1467] and may also be Late Celtic.

Another form of torque is made from a stout wire expanding into small flat discs at the end, a type which is also common among bracelets both in bronze and gold. A torque of this kind, together with a bracelet, is shown in Fig. 471, kindly lent by the Council of the Society of Antiquaries.

These objects were found with seven others in the parish of Llanrhaiadaryn-Mochnant, Montgomeryshire.[1468] One of them is said to have had pendants upon it. Several of them were too small to have served as torques for the neck, and were most probably bracelets or anklets. To these penannular ornaments I shall have to refer further on.

The other varieties of torques found in Britain seem decidedly to belong to the Late Celtic rather than to the Bronze Period, so that a brief notice of them will suffice. They are frequently made in two halves, hinged or dowelled together, and are often decorated with a series of ornamental beads.

A collar found in Lochar Moss, Dumfriesshire, is now in the British Museum.[1469] About one-third of it is formed by a solid piece of bronze of flat section, having the face ornamented with a peculiar wavy pattern and the outer rim with cabled lines. The rest consists of fluted melon-like beads with pulley-shaped collars between them. They appear to have been strung on an iron wire.

A portion of another collar found at Perdeswell,[1470] Claines, near Worcester, has the iron wire still preserved. The ornamental beads are flatter, with leaf-shaped projections upon them, and between them are smaller pulley-like beads.

Another, formed in much the same fashion as that from Lochar Moss, was found at Mow-road, Rochdale, Lancashire.[1471] This was in halves, dowelled together with iron pins.

Another, entirely of bronze, is made in two pieces, one part resembling a row of beads, the other engraved like a closely plaited cord, and was found at Embsay, near Skipton, Yorkshire.[1472]

A torque, weighing no less than 3 lbs. 10 ozs. avoirdupois, was found in the parish of Wraxall, Somerset.[1473] This also is in halves, with pins to form the joint. It is described as appearing to have been adorned with precious stones. Possibly, like some other objects of Late Celtic manufacture, it may have been inlaid with enamel of different colours.

Bracelets of the same type as the torque and bracelet shown in Fig. 471 have not unfrequently been found in Britain, though, perhaps, they are less common in bronze than in the more precious metal, gold.

They are sometimes slightly hollowed at the expanding ends. One found with the hoard at Marden, Kent,[1474] is of this kind. Another plain penannular bracelet tapers off at the ends instead of expanding. This latter is too small for an adult person.

One found, with various other bronze relics, at Ty Mawr, on Holyhead Mountain,[1475] expands at one end and tapers at the other. As is often the case, the inner side of the ring is flatter than the outer.

One, 2⅜ inches by 2 inches inside, expanding at each end, was in the Heathery Burn Cave hoard. Some others were also found there.

In some instances the section of the metal, instead of being rounded, is nearly square. Two such, tapering towards the ends, were found in Dorsetshire,[1476] with the torques already mentioned, and are now in the British Museum.

Three plain penannular bracelets were in the hoard of palstaves and socketed celts found at Wallington, Northumberland.

Several have been found in Scotland. Two such bracelets, the one slender and the other thick, were found at Achtertyre, Morayshire,[1477] in company with a socketed celt, a spear-head, Fig. 383, another spear-head, and some fragments of other bracelets and of tin. One of these is shown full-size in Fig. 472.

Another, 2½ inches in greatest diameter, slightly thickened at the extremities, was found in a peat moss at Conage, Banffshire.[1478]

Other penannular armlets, one of which is shown as Fig. 473, were found with socketed celts at Redhill, Premnay, Aberdeenshire,[1479] and are now in the Antiquarian Museum at Edinburgh; as is another found with burnt bones near Preston Tower, East Lothian.

This very simple penannular form of bracelet is found all over the world, and is indeed the form of necessity adopted wherever it became the fashion to wear thick metal wire round the arm. It was common among the ancient Assyrians, and several bronze bracelets of this form from Tel Sifr, in South Babylonia, are in the British Museum. The hammered copper bracelets of North America[1480] are usually penannular.

Two very massive penannular armlets, formed of rounded bronze fully ½ inch in diameter, and weighing about 12 ozs. each, were found with an agate bead and a spindle-whorl in a tumulus near Peninnis Head, in the Scilly Isles.[1481] One of these is shown in Fig. 474.

An imperfect armlet of thick bronze wire was found in a barrow at Wetton,[1482] by the late Mr. Bateman.

Four plain armillæ of bronze found with the spiral ring, Fig. 489, and with a palstave, in Woolmer Forest, Hants, are also in the Bateman Collection.[1483] As already mentioned, two small torques and a celt are said to have been found with them.[1484]

Ornamented bracelets, such as have been found in abundance in the Swiss Lake-dwellings, and such as are common in most continental countries, are scarce in Britain.

In the British Museum are two bracelets, slightly oval in section, and engraved with parallel lines, chevrons, &c., as will be seen by Fig. 475. They were found at Liss, Hampshire. Though the two ends are brought more closely together than usual in continental examples, the general character of these bracelets is much like that of some French and German specimens. The patina upon them closely resembles that on the celt Fig. 17, also found at Liss; so they were probably deposited together.

A curious penannular armlet with flat broad ends, and ornamented with punctured markings, was found with another armlet of smaller diameter, but plain, more massive, and broader, together with the remains of a skeleton, at Stoke Prior,[1485] Worcestershire. It is now in the British Museum, and is represented in Fig. 476. It may belong to a later period than that of which I am treating, and is possibly Saxon.

Fig. 477, kindly lent by the Council of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, shows another form of armlet, made from a bar of nearly semicircular section, bent into a circular form. The original, together with another of the same kind, were found near Stobo Castle,[1486] Peeblesshire, beneath a flat stone, and lying on a large boulder, under which was a collection of small stones, burnt and with apparently calcined bones among them.

Another armlet (3 inches) of the same type was found with an urn containing burnt bones in a cairn in the parish of Lanark.[1487] A bronze spear-head is stated to have been found with it.

One of the bracelets from the find at Camenz,[1488] in Saxony, is of nearly the same type.

Two circular armlets, one with the ends slightly apart, were found in Dorsetshire, one in the parish of Milton.[1489] I have an imperfect armlet of this kind, found with a palstave, at Winterhay Green, Ilminster, Somerset.

A penannular armlet of bronze, with compressed oval knobs at the extremities, was found by Mr. F. C. Lukis, with a jet armlet, in the cromlech of La Roche qui sonne,[1490] in Guernsey, and is shown in Fig. 478. The scale has been said to be one-third, though from information kindly furnished to me by the Rev. W. C. Lukis, F.S.A., it appears to be one-half.

A somewhat different and more elegantly ornamented armlet from Cornwall[1491] is shown in Fig. 479.

A bronze armilla, made from a flat ribbon of metal, ½ inch broad, and ornamented outside with a neatly engraved lozengy pattern, was found with an interment in a barrow at Castern,[1492] near Wetton, Staffordshire.

Another, about 1½ inch wide, ornamented with four parallel bands of vertical lines, with chevrons at the end, was found in a barrow at Normanton,[1493] Wilts, encircling the arm of a skeleton, and is shown in Fig. 480. In this example the ends overlap.

Another, with a series of small longitudinal beads or mouldings upon it, was found near Lake, Wilts, and is in the collection of the Rev. E. Duke. Some plain penannular bracelets from that district are in the same collection.

An armlet of nearly the same character, but narrower, was found in Thor’s Cave,[1494] near Wetton, Derbyshire. Remains of Late Celtic and of Roman date were found in the same cave.

A fluted bracelet was found with rings and other objects at Edington Burtle, Somersetshire.[1495]

A bracelet of bronze, of which some of the fragments are represented in Fig. 481, was found with a bronze torque and a two-looped palstave at West Buckland,[1496] Somersetshire. It is flat on the inside, so that the ornaments appear to have been cast in a mould, though subsequently the more delicate work was added by means of punches or gravers.

Another form of bracelet, probably of earlier date than some of those represented in the previous figures, is of the type shown in Fig. 482. It consists of a long bar of bronze, either circular or subquadrangular in section, doubled over so as to leave a broad loop in the middle, and then curved round so as to form the bracelet, the two ends of the bar being bent over to form a hook, which engages in the central loop. That shown in the figure was formerly in the collection of the late Sir Walter Trevelyan, and is now in the British Museum. As will be seen, the edges are in some parts minutely serrated. The original was discovered with two others, and a ring of the same metal, in a moss at Ham Cross, near Crawley, Sussex.

Four others, forming two pairs, neatly placed round a torque, were found at Hollingbury Hill,[1497] near Brighton, as already described. They are now in the British Museum. I have seen two others of the same kind which were found at Pyecombe, Sussex. They are in the collection of Mrs. Dickinson, of Hurstpierpoint. Another was found in a barrow near Brighton,[1498] with the long pin already mentioned, and is now at Alnwick Castle. This was slightly ornamented with a kind of herring-bone pattern.

Bracelets constructed on the same principle are sometimes formed of much thinner wire. One from the Heathery Burn Cave,[1499] already so often mentioned, is shown in Fig. 483.

Another of the same size and character, but made of even thinner wire, was found with a bronze razor, a button, and other antiquities, in the bed of a stream near Llangwyllog Church,[1500] Anglesea. These objects are now in the British Museum. The type is not confined to Britain, for a bracelet clasping in the same manner was found in the Lac du Bourget.[1501]

Penannular bracelets, like Fig. 473, with the ends slightly expanding, have been not unfrequently found in Ireland. One engraved by Wilde[1502] is described as of pure red copper.

In many there are large cup-shaped ends at about right angles to each other. One from Co. Cavan is shown in Fig. 484. I have another of the same type, but much smaller and lighter, from Ballymoney, Co. Antrim.

They much resemble the manillas or ring-money in use on the West Coast of Africa, but are more cup-shaped at the ends. It appears possible that, like some large Irish rings which will subsequently be described, they are not actually bracelets. The other armillæ engraved by Wilde appear to be of later date than the Bronze Period. The same may be said of the elegant bracelet shown full size in Fig. 485, which is certainly Late Celtic. It was found by Canon Greenwell, F.R.S., on the right arm of a female skeleton in a barrow at Cowlam,[1503] Yorkshire, and is similar to some found at Arras,[1504] in the same county.

Another somewhat plainer bracelet, with a short dowel at one end, fitting into a socket at the other, so as to form an almost invisible joint, was found with a fibula, Fig. 498, on the skeleton of an aged woman in another of the Cowlam[1505] barrows, and is shown in Fig. 486.

Another bronze armlet of the same period was found in a barrow in the parish of Crosby Garrett,[1506] Westmoreland. It encircled the right arm of a skeleton, and is penannular, “oval in section, and unornamented, except in having a series of notches along both edges.”

Many bracelets of Late Celtic date have been found at various times in Scotland. Some of these are of very ornate design, and extremely massive; while on others a repoussé pattern has been worked upon a plate of thin bronze. Such bracelets hardly come within the scope of the present work, but a few references to engravings of them are subjoined:—

Aboyne, Aberdeenshire (Arch. Journ., vol. xxii. p. 74; Wilson’s “Preh. Ann. of Scot.,” vol. ii. pp. 136, 139).

Alvah, Banffshire (Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot., vol. vi. p. 11, pl. iii. 1).

Muthill, Perthshire, now in the British Museum (Arch., vol. xxviii. p. 435).

Plunton Castle, Kirkcudbright (Arch. Journ., vol. xvi. p. 194; Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot., vol. iii. p. 236).

Strathdon, Aberdeenshire (Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot., vol. vi. p. 13, pl. iii. 2).

Among hoards of bronze antiquities belonging to the latter part of the Bronze Period, rings of various sizes are of not unfrequent occurrence. They are usually plain and of circular section, as if formed of a piece of cylindrical wire, though actually cast solid, and do not for the most part seem to require any illustrations. Some also are lozenge-shaped in section.

In the hoard found at Marden,[1507] Kent, there were six perfect bronze rings, varying in diameter from 1⅛ to 1⅜ inch. In the Heathery Burn Cave were numerous rings of circular section, and varying in thickness from ½ inch to 1½ inch in diameter. Many of these are now in the collection of Canon Greenwell, F.R.S. One, 2½ inches in diameter, was in the hoard found at Westow,[1508] Yorkshire, and may have been an armlet. Several stout rings, about 1 inch in diameter, “probably cast in moulds,” were found with various other antiquities in bronze at Ty Mawr,[1509] Holyhead, and a number of rings of various sizes, from ⅜ inch to 1½ inch in diameter, were found in the deposit at Llangwyllog,[1510] Anglesea. There were also three small rings in the great hoard found at Pant-y-maen,[1511] Glancych.

Several rings, some of lozenge-shaped section and of delicate workmanship, were found in the hoard at Taunton,[1512] with the pin and other objects already mentioned.

Such rings may have served various purposes, but were probably used as means of connection between different straps or accoutrements. Canon Greenwell has called my attention to two separate instances of two rings being found together, in company with a bronze sword, in one case near Medomsley, Durham, and in the other near Rothbury, Northumberland.

The rings found with remains of chariots at Hamden Hill,[1513] near Montacute, Somersetshire, appear to be of Late Celtic date, and to be hollow. A hollow ring, however, 1⅜ inch in diameter, and made from a strip of bronze, fashioned into a tube and left open on the inner side, was found with a socketed celt, a gouge, and other objects of bronze, at Melbourn,[1514] Cambridgeshire. Many of those from the cemetery at Hallstatt are of this kind, wrought from a thin plate of metal. Some hollow rings from Ireland will subsequently be mentioned.

Near Trillick,[1515] Co. Tyrone, a pin passing transversely through the body of two rings (see Fig. 496) was found, and with it two large rings about 3½ inches in diameter, and four smaller, about 2 inches. These latter appear to be hollow, with probably a clay core inside. With these objects a socketed celt and a bronze hammer were found.

Nearly six hundred bronze rings are in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy.

Some of the Irish rings are cast in pairs, like a figure of 8.[1516] Others of large size have smaller rings cast upon them. That shown in Fig. 487, borrowed from Wilde,[1517] is 4¼ inches in diameter, with rings of 1½ inches diameter upon it. Sir W. Wilde was inclined to regard it as a bangle with two rings by which to suspend it, but this appears to me very doubtful. I have an almost identical example of the form from Ballymoney, Co. Antrim.

A gold ring, 4¼ inches in diameter, with a single small ring playing upon it, from the great Clare find, is figured by Wilde.[1518] He states that “similar articles are occasionally observed sculptured upon the breasts of the statues of ancient Roman generals, the small ring being attached to the dress.”

Some few bronze ornaments, which have been thought to be finger rings, have from time to time been found associated with other objects of the same metal, such as armlets, torques, &c.

One found with the armlets and palstaves in Woolmer Forest,[1519] Hants, as already mentioned, is shown in Fig. 488. It has been formed from a small quadrangular bar of metal, cylindrical at the ends, twisted after the manner of an ordinary torque, and subsequently coiled into a spiral ring. Mr. Bateman[1520] describes it as a finger ring. With it was also another twisted bronze ring of the same kind, but of only one coil. It appears doubtful whether these rings were not more of the nature of ornamental beads. It will be remembered that three spiral rings of the same kind, but plain and of about four coils each, were found on the extremities of the torque discovered at Hollingbury Hill,[1521] Sussex. They were considerably too large to fit on the torque, and were regarded as intended in some way to fasten the garment. Some rings of this kind were found with torques near Amesbury, as already mentioned. A ring of a single coil, but made from a twisted bar like that in the figure, was in the hoard found at Camenz,[1522] Saxony, in which also were fragments of torques.

I have three small twisted penannular rings of gold which were found with a small torque of the same metal near Carcassonne, Aude. They are of different sizes and weights, but are all too small for the finger or for ear-rings. One of them is indeed too small to pass over the recurved end of the torque, but the ends may possibly have been pinched together since it was found. I am not aware that any of the rings were ever actually upon the torque, though I have reason to believe they were found with it.

Mr. Franks has recently presented to the British Museum a gold torque from Lincolnshire, which has three banded rings of gold, strung like beads upon it.

Some small penannular rings found on a gold torque at Boyton have already been mentioned.

The penannular rings so often found in Ireland, and commonly called ring money, may after all be of the nature of beads.

The large hollow penannular ornaments made of thin gold, and nearly triangular in section, seem also to be of the nature of beads or possibly clasps. Straps passed through the narrow notch would require some trouble to take out; but still such beads could be dislodged from their string without its ends being unfastened. The ornament shown in Fig. 489 was found near Dumbarton.[1523]

Others, similar, have been found in Anglesea, Heathery Burn Cave, near Alnwick,[1524] and in other places. They occur also in Ireland.[1525] They have frequently been found associated with armlets. Some Egyptian rings of carnelian, ivory, and other materials have similar notches through them. They have, however, been regarded as ear-rings.

Bronze finger rings seem to have been in occasional use.

In a perished urn with burnt bones, found with several others, one containing a barbed flint arrow-head, in the cemetery at Stanlake,[1526] Oxfordshire, there was a spiral bronze finger ring of the plainest form, the only fragment of metal brought to light during nearly a month’s excavations by Mr. Akerman and Mr. Stone. What may have been a finger ring was also found in the Heathery Burn Cave,[1527] Durham. It is formed of stout wire, the ends expanding, and slightly overlapping each other, and is ⅞ inch in diameter.

In the hoard of bronze antiquities found near Edington Burtle,[1528] Somersetshire, were several small rings; but with one exception they are hardly such as could have served for finger rings. This exceptional ring is penannular, and fluted externally like the bracelet found with it in the same hoard. The form is not unlike that of the gold ring engraved by Wilde[1529] as his Fig. 609.

Another form of ornament, the ear-ring, appears to have been known in Britain during the Bronze Period. In two of the barrows on the Yorkshire Wolds, explored by Canon Greenwell, F.R.S., female skeletons were found accompanied by such ornaments.

In a barrow at Cowlam,[1530] “touching the temporal bones, which were stained green by the contact, were two ear-rings of bronze. They have been made by beating the one end of a piece of bronze flat, and forming the other end into a pin-shaped termination. This pin had been passed through the lobe of the ear and then bent round, the other and flat end being bent over it.” Thus the ear-ring must have been “permanently fixed in the ear.” One of these rings is, by Canon Greenwell’s kindness, shown as Fig. 490, as is one from Goodmanham,[1531] in Fig. 491.

In the latter case there was a bronze awl, or drill, behind the head; the ear-ring here figured was at the right ear, and its fellow, in a more broken condition, lay under the left shoulder. The better preserved of the two is somewhat imperfect, and may, I think, have formed a perfect circle when whole.

Mr. Bateman records finding in a barrow called Stakor Hill,[1532] near Burton, a female skeleton, “the mastoid bones of which were dyed green from contact with two small pieces of thin bronze bent in the middle just sufficiently to clasp the edge or lobe of the ear.” With the skeleton was a flint “javelin head,” and Mr. Bateman considered the interment to be the oldest he had met with in which metal was present.

By way of illustration, a much longer form of trough-shaped ear-ring may be adduced, though the metal in this instance is gold and not bronze. That shown in Fig. 492 was found with another in a stone cist at Orton, Morayshire.[1533]

It seems possible that a lunette or diadem of gold was buried with these ear-rings.

A pair of circular embossed plates, with a beaded ring on each and a smaller disc above, were found in a tumulus near Lake, Wilts, and have been regarded as ear-rings. They are in the collection of the Rev. E. Duke.

In the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy[1534] is another gold ornament of the same form as Fig. 492. It is, however, smaller, and the lower part is at present flat. Gold penannular rings of torque-like patterns, pointed at each end, and which may have been ear-rings, and not bead-like ornaments, are not uncommon in Ireland and Britain.[1535] Rings of nearly the same kind are still in use in Northern Africa. Plain double-pointed penannular ear-rings in bronze are also found, but I am uncertain as to the period to which they should be assigned. Some appear to be of Saxon date.[1536]

I have a pair of ear-rings of circular form from Hallstatt, about 2 inches in diameter, of hollow bronze, made from a thin plate, and with one end pointed which fits into a socket at the other end. Other ear-rings of bronze,[1537] from the same cemetery, have a small ring encircling them, to which, in one instance, three small spherical bells are attached.

In the Laibach Museum are some bronze ear-rings of the Early Iron Age, much like those from Goodmanham, but broader.

Ear-rings of the Bronze Period appear to be almost unknown in France. I have, however, specimens found with a hoard of bronze socketed celts, fragments of swords, spear-heads, bracelets, and a variety of other objects at Dreuil, near Amiens, about 1872.

They are two in number, in form like Fig. 490, but rather shorter. One of them is coiled up, and the other has the broad part nearly flat. Each is ornamented with some parallel lines stamped in across the broader part. Several small hollow and some solid rings, circular, semicircular, and flattened in section, were in the same hoard.

Some few objects of bead-like character have from time to time been found in barrows and with other bronze objects. Dr. Thurnam[1538] describes a tubular bronze bead, 1¼ inch long, found in a barrow in Dorset, and now in Mr. Durden’s collection. He thinks the bead mentioned by Sir R. Colt Hoare as found in a barrow near Fovant[1539] may have been the spheroidal head of the bronze pin with which it was found. Some beads of amber and jet were, however, discovered with it.

A notched bead of tin, like a number of small beads strung together, accompanied a little pin of copper or bronze, most probably an awl, and some conical buttons of bone or ivory, in a barrow on Sutton Verney Down,[1540] in which there had been deposited a burnt body. Hoare says that “it is the only article of that metal we have ever found in a barrow.”

Small beads, or more probably drum-shaped buttons of gold, as suggested by Dr. Thurnam,[1541] have also been found in the Wiltshire barrows.

Beads formed of joints of encrinites, with others formed of burnt clay, as well as a necklace formed of the shells of dentalium, were found in a barrow near Winterbourn Stoke.[1542] Glass beads of the notched form have been found with burnt interments, and frequently with bronze instruments in others of the Wiltshire barrows.[1543] Other beads have spiral ornaments in white upon a blue ground. A blue glass bead, with three yellow spirals on it, was found with the point of a bronze blade in a cist with burnt bones in a barrow at Eddertoun, Ross-shire.[1544] Such beads, known as Clachan Nathaireach,[1545] or serpent stones, have been used as charms for diseased cattle and other evils.

Glass beads with the same spiral ornamentation have been found in the cemetery at Hallstatt, and their presence in these graves certainly affords an argument for assigning them to a comparatively late period, or at all events to a time when commerce with the Continent was well established.

Among the objects found at Exning, Suffolk,[1546] are some “curious bullæ” with clay cores, but they appear to belong to a later date.

As will be seen from the list of personal ornaments described in the preceding pages, their forms are but few and their number small in the British Islands, as compared with those of analogous objects found in some continental countries, as, for instance, Scandinavia and Switzerland. The absence of several forms of torques has already been mentioned; the Danish and North German lunette, or diadem-like bandlets, are also never found in this country, though, perhaps, the crescent-shaped gold plates or “minds” of the Irish antiquaries may represent the same class of ornaments. Spirals formed by coiling long tapering pieces of wire, such as are common in Scandinavia and throughout Germany, are also unknown, and this circumstance affords an argument against there having been any direct intercourse in very early days between this country and Etruria, where such spiral ornaments abounded. Besides this absence of spirals formed of solid metal, the engraved spiral ornament which in some countries is characteristic of the Bronze Period may be said to be absolutely unknown in Britain. The nearest approach to it is the ring ornament formed of concentric circles.

The bracelets formed of cylindrical coils of wire are also unknown, as well as those of hollowed bronze with discoidal ends, such as are so common in the Swiss Lake-habitations. Decorated pendants, like those which are found in Switzerland and the South of France, are also wanting. Altogether the bronze ornaments of Britain are neither abundant nor, as a rule, highly artistic; and it would appear that here, at all events, the serviceable qualities of bronze were more highly appreciated than its decorative lustre.

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