The Bronze Age in Ireland Part 5

Hanover, 1 Schulenburg (Leine) Springe (1911).

CHAPTER V

DAGGERS AND RAPIERS

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 55.--Stone celt, Bronze dagger with gold band, and Urn found in Topped Mountain Cairn, Co. Fermanagh.]

As has been mentioned, as well as being parent to the spear-head, the small weak knife-dagger frequently found in early Bronze-Age burials also developed into the true dagger-blade, and in course of time into the sword. Bronze daggers have often been found in Ireland; there are about forty in the National Collection. Among the most interesting finds of these early daggers may be mentioned that discovered in 1897 at an interment at Topped Mountain Cairn, County Fermanagh. This dagger measures 5-5/8 inches, and is covered with a beautiful blue patina. It is decorated with raised lines on each side of the blade, and has two small rivets. It was discovered in a cist in the cairn lying at the right side of the skull of an uncremated body, and in the same place was a small band of gold which appears to have been half of a band of that metal which was probably round the handle of the dagger (fig. 55). Another interesting find is the small bronze dagger discovered with urns and cremated bones in a cist at Annaghkeen Cairn, County Galway, in 1908.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 56.--Dagger and Rapier blades.]

In course of time the length of the dagger-blade was increased; and later examples are wonderful specimens of casting. The earlier daggers were either attached to the handle by rivets, or else notches were left in the base of the blade for the attachment. The manner of hafting them is quite clear, as a few hafted examples have been found.

Some had bronze handles cast separately (fig. 56); others had handles of horn or wood (fig. 57); but the hilts for the most part were made of some perishable substance, and they have consequently not been recovered. The scolloped mark left by the hilt is often quite plainly to be seen on the blade. In later times the handle was sometimes cast in one piece with the blade; but the division between the handle and the blade is always quite clearly marked. The decoration of the later dagger-blades takes the form of a number of triangles at the base of the blade, and the extreme similarity in decoration between the Italian and the early northern and western daggers has led Montelius to consider the latter as derived from the former; and this is enforced in the case of the Irish examples by the series of small hatched-triangles which have been found at the base of two well-known Irish examples (fig. 56).

The rapiers were evolved quite naturally by lengthening the dagger-blade; and this form was probably influenced also, as will be mentioned later, by contemporary weapons in use in the Mediterranean lands.

The longest rapier ever found in Western Europe is the splendid weapon found at Lissane, Co. Derry, in 1867, which measures 30-1/4 inches in length (fig. 59). Another very remarkable Irish example is the short rapier found in Upper Lough Erne, and obtained by Mr. Thomas Plunkett, M.R.I.A., from the finder. This weapon is a wonderfully fine piece of casting. It measures 16-3/4 inches in length (fig. 58).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 57.--Dagger with horn handle found at Ballymoney, Co. Antrim.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 58.--Rapier found in Upper Lough Erne.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 59.--Rapier found at Lissane, Co. Derry.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 60.--Rapiers and Daggers found in Ireland.]

The rapiers belong to the middle and later portions of the Bronze Age.

This type of weapon is common in France, and is described by M.

Dechelette as widely spread in the British Islands and the north of France, and as having been introduced from there into South Germany and the region of the Middle Rhine.[16] The rapiers of advanced type he places in the third division of the Bronze Age, as they have been found in Bronze-Age tumuli of that period, as at Staadorf, Haut Palatinat (1600-1300 B.C.). Montelius places the rapiers in his fourth period dated at the end of the fifteenth to the middle of the twelfth century B.C.,[17] so that his dating of these objects practically coincides with that of M. Dechelette. It is now well recognized that the swords of the aegean-Mycenaean area were developed on parallel lines to those of Western Europe. We find that the long rapiers or thrusting swords are developed from the tanged Cypriote dagger, and that the true sword is a later evolution from the rapier. It is hardly to be doubted that some of the western forms of daggers and rapiers were influenced by Mycenaean types; and the discovery in Sicily of rapiers of Mycenaean type with pottery dated as recent Minoan III, establishes a direct bond between the aegean and Western Europe.[18]

[16] "Manuel d'Archeologie," vol. ii, p. 208.

[17] "Archaeologia," vol. lxi, p. 162, and pl. xv.

[18] "Manuel d'Archeologie," vol. ii, p. 214.

CHAPTER VI

GOLD GORGETS

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 61.--Gold Gorget found in Ireland, formerly in the possession of the Earl of Charleville. From Vetusta Monumenta, Vol. v, Pl. xxviii.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE II. Irish Gold Gorgets. _p. 62._]

Among the most striking of the gold ornaments in the National Collection are the five gold gorgets or neck-collars, with the ends decorated with ornamented disks. These are very elaborately decorated, and of great ma.s.siveness. Two others mentioned as having been found in Ireland, one of which was formerly in the possession of the Earl of Charleville, were figured in "Vetusta Monumenta." Vallancey states that another was found in the County Longford. A few disks have also been found which may have been portions of these gorgets. The neck-portion of the gorgets is arranged in three rows of raised ridges, and these are ornamented with rows of small bosses, the depressions of the ridges being occupied with a narrow rope-shaped fillet. In some cases the ridges are left plain.

The small disks at the terminals of the collar are remarkable; they measure about 2-7/8 or 3 inches in diameter, and are decorated with a centre and side bosses, surrounded with concentric circles. They much resemble in miniature the round shields or bucklers of the late Bronze Age, but they also show some resemblance to the so-called sun-disks which have been found in Ireland, and which will be described later on. Unfortunately the gorgets have in no case been found with any accompanying objects which would a.s.sist in dating them, and in fact in only two cases have details as to their finding been preserved, one found at Ardcroney, near Nenagh, County Tipperary, the other at Tony Hill, Croom, County Limerick. Their ornamentation, however, would seem to place them in the Hallstatt period, first Iron Age, which may be dated at about 700-600 B.C. Their form and ornamentation may be compared with that of the splendid gold collar from Cintra, Lisbon, now in the British Museum,[19] and also with the triple bronze collars common in Scandinavia and north Germany, all of which are referred to the Hallstatt period. This period is at present not well represented in Ireland or the British Isles; and it is doubtful whether iron came into general use in Ireland till about the third century B.C.

[19] "British Museum Bronze-Age Guide," p. 148.

One point of much interest must be noticed. In one of the gorgets shown in Plate II, where the disk is attached to the gorget, above the line where the end of the plate pa.s.ses into the boss, three perpendicular and two cross-st.i.tches can be seen. Some of these sewings are made by means of slight square wire, but in others the fastenings are composed of fine woollen thread, round which is twisted spirally a thin, flat strip of gold. These strips are one of the oldest specimens of woollen cordage now in existence in Ireland.

GOLD SUN-DISKS

We have already referred to the flat disks of gold, a number of which have been found in Ireland. There are four in the British Museum, and no less than fifteen in the National Collection at Dublin. In four cases they have been found in pairs--one pair at Ballina, County Mayo, another pair at Tydavnet, County Monaghan, a third at Cloyne, Co. Cork, and the fourth at Castle Martyr, Co. Cork. Some of these disks are ornamented with concentric circles; others have a cruciform ornament which resembles the four-spoked chariot-wheel, and is a well-known sun symbol.

When these objects were first discovered, their origin and use were quite unknown; and Mr. Reginald A. Smith, of the British Museum, was the first to point out their resemblance to the gold disk, decorated with spirals, affixed to a bronze sun-chariot, found in Trundholm Moss, Zealand, in 1902. The bronze chariot consisted of a bronze disk mounted on wheels and drawn by a horse, the gold disk being affixed to the bronze one. The ornamentation of the Irish disks is somewhat different, as the spiral does not appear, its place being taken by the concentric circle. The Trundholm sun-chariot is dated by Prof. Sophus Muller at before 1000 B.C. The Trundholm disk is admittedly connected with sun-worship, as is also the cruciform ornament on the Irish disks. The spoked-wheel is a well-known solar symbol; and similar designs have been found on the bases of some Irish food-vessels, and may also be compared with some of the markings at Dowth.[20] The prevalence of sun-worship in the Bronze Age need not be further gone into here; but the gold disks are of great interest, as furnishing another point of contact between Ireland and Scandinavia in the Bronze Age. The finding of Irish gold lunulae in Denmark, and the occurrence of Scandinavian amber in Irish finds of the Bronze-Age, have already been mentioned.

[20] "New Grange and other Incised Tumuli," p. 59, fig. 39.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE III. Gold sun-disks. _p. 64._]

GOLD b.a.l.l.s

We may also mention the large hollow golden b.a.l.l.s of which seven are in the National collection, one in the possession of Mr. H. J. B.

Clements, and another in the British Museum. Eleven of these golden b.a.l.l.s were found in 1834 at Carrick-on-Shannon.[21] There has been much conjecture as to the use these b.a.l.l.s were put to, and it has been suggested that as their large size would render them inconvenient as personal ornaments, they were probably used to decorate a horse. If so they may have been attached to the bridle like the large b.a.l.l.s shown on the horses' bridles in the bronze scabbard from Hallstatt, dated La Tene I. See Dechelette, "Manuel d'Archeologie," vol. ii, p. 770. The Golden Peytrell found at Mold, Flintshire, may be instanced to show that gold was sometimes used to decorate horses; and if the gold b.a.l.l.s were really used for this purpose, we may well endorse what the author of the "British Museum Bronze-Age Guide" says when he writes: "A discovery of this kind demonstrates in a striking manner the abundance of gold at the end of our Bronze period."[22]

[21] Proc. Royal Irish Academy, vol. x.x.x, Sec. C, p. 450.

[22] "British Museum Bronze-Age Guide," p. 150.

CLARE FIND

Another type of neck-ornaments are the thin gold gorgets with funnel-shaped ends, many of which were found in the great Clare find.

These gorgets are quite plain, except for a little ornamentation at the extreme ends near the funnel-shaped extremities. There are five of these objects in the National Collection, and all were found together in the celebrated Clare find. This find--the largest collective one of gold objects ever made in Western Europe--was discovered in making a railway-cutting for the Limerick and Ennis Railway in 1854. A gang of labourers were digging near an old hawthorn-bush, a little distance to the south of the railway bridge in Moghaun north, on the west side of the line of the great fort, and opposite the lough, when they undermined a kind of cist. The fall of one of the containing-stones disclosed a ma.s.s of gold ornaments--gorgets, bracelets of all sizes with cup-shaped ends, and a few ingots of gold. The find, from a numerical point of view, far surpa.s.sed anything ever made, but none of the objects were highly ornamented or of a special type.

The fact of this immense number of gold ornaments being hidden in a cist in this way has given rise to many conjectures; but in the absence of any other explanation, it may be suggested that the objects had been collected together, and hidden purposely, with the idea of returning and regaining possession of them later. The value of the find has been estimated at at least 3,000. Unfortunately, most of the objects were sold to jewellers and melted down, but a large number were exhibited at the Archaeological Inst.i.tute by Dr. Todd and Lord Talbot de Malahide in 1854, and casts of these were taken, and a set is now in the National Collection. There are also a small number of the originals in the Royal Irish Academy's collection (Plate IV).

Otherwise such objects of the find as escaped the melting-pot were scattered, and have found their way into different museums and private collections. As has been mentioned, the objects of this find did not show any remarkable types, and for the most part consisted of very thin bracelets and penannular rings with cup-shaped ends. It is probable that, as well as being ornaments, they served as a kind of currency.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE IV. Portion of the great Clare find. _p. 66._]

PENANNULAR RINGS AND RING-MONEY

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 62.--Gold fibulae, and other objects found together at Coachford, Co. Cork.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 63.--Sixteenth-century bronze casting from Benin, showing Europeans holding manillas (after Read and Dalton, _Antiquities of the City of Benin_).]

The large number of penannular rings with cup-shaped ends which have been found from time to time in the island, brings us on to the general question of the so-called Irish fibulae. In Ireland penannular rings with cup-shaped ends of copper or bronze are very rare, only about half a dozen being known, while fibulae of gold are exceedingly common. The Coachford find, in which amber beads, gold fibulae, and a copper or bronze fibula were all found together, shows that the objects were contemporary; and as this find may be placed at the end of the Bronze Age, it shows that these objects were in use at that period (fig. 62). On the other hand, it is likely that their use began earlier and continued for a long period. These objects when made of gold are of two shapes--in the one case the expanded cups are large and flat and the connecting bar is bow-shaped, and is striated. These have been conjectured to have been used as brooches for fastening a garment; and their form was probably influenced by the Scandinavian spectacle-brooches, the bows of the latter having, in some cases, the same decoration. Except for the striations on the connecting link, the Irish so-called mamillary fibulae are almost always plain; but Vallancey has figured two examples, one of which is engraved with triangular, and the other with lozenge, ornaments. There is also the well-known example in Trinity College, Dublin, in which the surfaces of the cups are completely covered with concentric circle ornament, the inside rims of the cups being decorated with hatched triangles, and the neckings of what may be called the handle, with chevron and herring-bone pattern, while along the back of the handle is an ornament of lozenges. In the second type these objects a.s.sume the shape of a bracelet; and the expanded ends are sometimes cup-shaped and sometimes plain. From the extreme similarity between the shape of these, whether in gold or bronze, to the so-called African manillas, it has been conjectured the Irish examples, like the African, may have been used as a medium of exchange; and on the whole it seems probable that such was the case, the dividing line between what were used for ornaments and what may have been used for exchange not being at all easily defined (figs. 63 and 64).