FOOTNOTES:
[283] Primeval Antiquities, p. 137.
[284] Archæologia, vol. xviii. p. 343.
[285] Mongez, Mém. de l'Instit.
[286] Article Bronze, Penny Cyclopædia, vol. v. p. 468.
[287] The extracts from Dr. Robinson's interesting communication are copied from a report of the Second Meeting of the Royal Irish Academy, session 1848-9, in Freeman's Dublin Journal. From the length of the report, its minuteness, and explanatory footnotes, it appears to have been furnished by the author; but like all newspaper reports of scientific proceedings, it must be liable to errors for which the author is not responsible. From a personal opportunity courteously afforded me, during the meeting of the British Association at Edinburgh this year, of consulting Dr. Robinson on the subject, I learned that the uniformity of results in his analyses was only comparative, and that lead had not been tested for.
[288] It may be proper to add, that in selecting specimens of native bronze implements from the Scottish collection for the purpose of analysis, no difficulty was found in obtaining broken fragments suitable for the purpose, without destroying any perfect example of primitive art.
[289] Archæologia, vol. iii. p. 355.
[290] Prichard's Hist. of Mankind, vol. ii. p. 92.
[291] Biblio. Topog. Britan. vol. ii. p. 303.
CHAPTER IV.
WEAPONS AND IMPLEMENTS.
The works of the Bronze Period possess an entirely new and distinct source of interest from those which preceded them, in so far as they exhibit not only the skill and ingenuity which is prompted by necessity, but also the graceful varieties of form and decoration which give evidence of the pleasurable exercise of thought and fancy. Were we indeed to select the most perfect and highly finished productions resulting from the knowledge of working in metals, and to place these alongside of the best works of the Stone Period, we could hardly avoid the conclusions, already adopted by northern archæologists, that the works in metal belong to an entirely new and distinct race.[292] A more careful investigation, however, tends greatly to modify such conclusions in regard to the British bronze remains. Independently of the probable presence of Allophylian races in Britain prior to the earliest arrival of the Celtæ—which the evidence already adduced of the very remote period to which the existence of a human population must be assigned seems alone sufficient to determine in the affirmative—there can be no doubt that stone implements were in use even within the Celtic era, and that it was not by an abrupt substitution but by a gradual transition that they were entirely displaced by those of metal. Reference has already been made to some striking indications of this in the various moulds which have been discovered from time to time in the British Isles. It is still more obvious in the numerous examples of weapons and tools. When classified on the same simple and natural principle which induces us to recognise the Stone Period as prior to that of bronze, we detect the evidences of a slow and very gradual change, and discover the link which unites the two periods as in regular and orderly succession. In the earliest bronze axes the form of their prototype in stone is repeated with little or no variation. Both are equally deficient in any stop-ridge, loop, or perforation to facilitate the securing of them to a handle; and we cannot avoid recognising in the latter the new materials in the hands of the old worker in stone. Another and no less suggestive class of illustrative examples of this transition-period may be detected in the stone implements occasionally discovered, obviously made in imitation of bronze weapons. Mr. G. V. Dunoyer remarks in a valuable article on bronze celts,[293] in referring to a stone axe in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, very closely resembling the simplest form of bronze axe,—"So remarkable is this similarity, that it is possible to suppose this class of weapon to be the last link between the rude wedge-shaped stone celt and that of bronze; or in it we may perceive an attempt to revert to the old material, improving the form after that of the earliest metal implement." It is perhaps still more legitimate to infer from it the scarcity of the metals at this early period compelling the axe-maker, while adopting the newer models, to retain the only material at his command.
Much learned and very profitless controversy has been carried on respecting the weapons of the Bronze Period. The archæological works of last century and of the early years of the present century, abound with elaborate demonstrations of the correspondence of celts and spear-heads to the Roman securis, hasta, and pilum. It may be doubted if some of the more recent attempts to determine the exact purpose for which each variety of bronze implement was designed tend to much more satisfactory results. When it is considered that the most expert and sagacious archæologist would probably be puzzled to determine the purpose of one-half the tools of a modern carpenter or lock-smith, it is surely assuming too much, when he stumbles on the hoarded weapons and implements of the old Briton, who has reposed underneath his monumental tumulus, with all the secrets of his craft buried with him, for full two thousand years, to pretend to more than a very general determination of their uses. Much mischief indeed is done in the present stage of the science by such attempts at "being wise above that which is written." These relics are our written records of the old ages, and it is well that we should avoid bringing their chroniclings into discredit by forcing on them an interpretation they will not legitimately bear.
The capabilities of the new material introduced to the old workers in stone, were pregnant with all the elements of progress, and one of the most interesting features belonging to the Archaic Period is the gradual development of skill, inventive ingenuity, and artistic decorative fancy, in the series of bronze weapons and implements. The following examples found in Scotland, while they serve to illustrate this feature of progressive improvement, may also in some degree help towards the establishment of a fixed nomenclature; the want of which renders so many "Statistical" and other accounts of important discoveries utterly useless for all practical purposes.
The following is an attempt to define such a system of classification as the Scottish examples naturally admit of, assuming every additional improvement, complexity, or ornamentation as evidence of progress, and therefore of work of a later date.[294]
Class I. consists of bronze implements made apparently in imitation of the older ones of stone, and to which the name of Celt-axes may therefore be very consistently applied. Of these a very primitive specimen in the Scottish Museum is little more than an imperfectly squared oblong piece of yellow bronze, or "Celtic brass," full of air-holes, and evidently cast in sand. It was found in the Moss of Cree, near Wigtown, in Galloway. The analysis of another nearly similar to this, and found a few miles from Edinburgh, has been given in the previous chapter. To this class also have belonged the implements cast in the polygonal stone mould now in Belfast.[295] The simplicity of the mould completely corresponds with the primitive character of the manufactures in which it was employed; the axe-heads having been fashioned merely by pouring the melted metal into the exposed indentation in the stone, as the previous examples were moulded in an impression in sand.
Class II.—In this group may with considerable propriety be placed a peculiar class of bronze axes, of comparatively rare occurrence in Scotland, and apparently unknown in English collections, though frequently met with in Ireland. To these I would propose to apply the name of Spiked Axe. The accompanying woodcut, which represents one found along with other bronze relics at Strachur, Argyleshire, will convey a better idea of the peculiar characteristics of the second class of axes than any description. It might be taken for the normal type of the medieval battle-axe, which the mail-clad knights of the thirteenth century bore at their saddle-bow. The few examples met with almost invariably exhibit the same uniformity of thickness throughout, accompanied with an imperfect adaptation for hafting, so as to leave us in little doubt as to the true place of the spiked axe, first in order after its simpler prototype.
Class III. consists of axe-heads, not greatly dissimilar in general form to those of the first class, but larger, and exhibiting manifest evidence of the improvements of experienced workmen. For these the term Axe-blades, plain or incised, appears most suitable. They are sometimes finished with a broad flange along the sides, thereby securing at once economy of material with lightness and strength; and are, oftener than any other bronze relics, decorated with incised ornamental patterns corresponding to those which occur on the pottery of the same period. This kind of ornamentation, though frequently executed with considerable taste, presents a striking contrast to the graceful mouldings and perforations of the more advanced period. It appears to have been produced in the most simple manner, by striking the surface with a punch, sometimes (as in an example in the Scottish Museum, which measures 5¾ inches long) with no very marked attempt at a definite pattern. Other, however, are characterized by much more taste and evidences of design. The very fine specimen figured here, from a drawing by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, Bart., is like the former, of bright yellow metal. It was discovered in the year 1818, a few inches below the surface on the Moor of Sluie, and not far from the river Findhorn, Morayshire. Various interesting relics have been found in this locality. In the month of March, of the same year, a cist was uncovered on the moor, within which lay a bronze spear-head of the primitive type, 11¼ inches in length, and perforated with four holes for attaching it to a handle. The point is considerably corroded and imperfect, and was apparently above an inch longer when complete: beside it lay two unusually large bronze celt-axes, about half an inch thick, and six inches long. Drawings and a description of these were communicated to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland at the time of their discovery, by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, and are now preserved among the Society's MSS. Various examples of similarly ornamented axe-blades, in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy, are engraved in the fourth volume of the Archæological Journal. A very beautiful and unique specimen, found in the county of Tipperary in 1843, and now in the collection of the British Museum, is figured in the sixth volume of the same Journal.[296] An English engraved axe-blade, of analogous type, found near Clare, in Suffolk, along with eighteen others of various sizes, and with several similarly ornamented, is figured in the Archæologia;[297] and a few other examples of this rare class of primitive decorated weapons, from various localities, are preserved in the British Museum. These incised lines are supposed by many to have been designed for use as well as ornament, and several allusions, by ancient Irish writers, to the employment of poisoned weapons by the Celtic natives, are referred to in confirmation of the probability that the indented patterns were wrought on the axe-blade to adapt it for retaining the poison with which it was anointed preparatory to the conflict. The rarity of the occurrence of such incised lines militates in some degree against this theory; but it will be seen hereafter that other devices of more frequent adoption may have answered the same barbarous and deadly purpose.
Class IV. includes a variety of the implements to which archæologists are now generally agreed in applying the old Scandinavian term Paalstab, or its recently adopted English synonyme, Palstave, originally designating a weapon employed in battering the shields of the foe. Their general characteristics partake more of carpentering tools than of weapons of war, but in this, as in many other instances, it is difficult to draw the distinction with any certainty, where the objects might be of equal avail for both purposes. The palstave consists of a wedge, more or less axe-shaped, having a groove on each side, generally terminating in a stop-ridge, by means of which it was united to a cleft haft, and with projecting lateral ridges, designed still farther to secure its hold on the handle. Various improvements on the primitive form have obviously been suggested by experience. The woodcut represents a fine example in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, found on the farm of Kilnotrie, parish of Crossmichael, in the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright. The original measures 6¾ inches in length. Notwithstanding the axe-like shape of a few of the largest of these implements, I cannot but think that the idea of the mode of hafting them by means of a bent stick, as recently assumed,[298] appears forced and improbable. In all the additions, apparently suggested by experience, for the purpose of more effectually securing it to the handle, no single example has been found with a bent groove, a hollow socket or perforation, or any other of the most simple and obvious adaptations of the metal to such a purpose. It cannot for a moment be supposed that such an improvement was beyond the skill or ingenuity of the metallurgist. In the example figured here, the hole through the end appears to have been produced in the casting. The labour of hewing the mould, or hammering the palstave into the desired shape, with which the old worker in stone was already familiar, would scarcely exceed that involved in the adaptation of each wooden haft. Mr. James Yates has suggested, in an ingenious communication to the Archæological Institute, that one of the most important uses to which bronze celts were applied was in destroying fortifications, entrenchments, and similar military works.[299] In illustration of this the author engraves two examples from the Nimroud Marbles, in which Assyrian soldiers are seen breaking through a wall of brick or small stones, by means of chisels not greatly dissimilar to our bronze celts, but fitted to a straight wooden handle. For such operations many of the larger palstaves would be no less suitable. The one here figured, from the original, measuring 7½ inches in length, in the valuable collection formed by Sir John Clerk at Penicuick House, seems peculiarly adapted for the purpose. Mr. Yates accordingly arrives at the conclusion, that "wherever we should now use the spade, the crow-bar, or the pick-axe, the ancients used the palstave or the hollow celt, fastened to a straight wooden shaft; and this was the practice, not only of the Romans, but of the Greeks and Macedonians, the Hebrews, Assyrians, and Carthaginians, and of all nations to which they extended the knowledge of their arts, or which were sufficiently advanced in civilisation to dwell in fortified places."[300] This farther conclusion inevitably follows, if we adopt the ingenious theory of Mr. Yates,—that the Britons of the Bronze Period had advanced to a similar state of civilisation; nor is it inconsistent with the ideas we are led to form of their skill and progress in the arts, that they had already reared the ingenious earth-works which still crown the summit of many a height both in England and Scotland. Against such works, however, even the largest of the bronze palstaves would prove but an inefficient implement, whether used as a crow-bar or hatchet, and if employed as a spade, the most of them would be of somewhat less avail than an ordinary tablespoon! It is not always easy to discriminate unhesitatingly between the true axe-head and the palstave. In many examples, where the general shape is completely that of the axe-blade, both the stop-ridge and side flanges are formed, while the narrow palstave no less frequently wants the stop-ridge. In Sir Robert Sibbald's History of Fife and Kinross, one of the latter class of palstaves is engraved, with a broad double flange, evidently adapted for insertion in a cleft handle, and which he has entitled a "brass axe found in a cairn of stones." Numerous other examples have been discovered under similar circumstances, leaving no room to doubt of their native origin, or of the estimation in which they were held by their primitive owners.
Class V. includes an improved variety of palstaves having a loop or ear attached to them, and in many instances the sides overlapping to a considerable extent, occasionally so much so as to meet, and form a perforation or socket for receiving the handle. In this class the overlapping flange is often only on one side, especially where it is turned over so as to form a socket; but in no example which I have examined is there any adaptation of it properly suggestive of the assumed theory of a bent handle, designed to admit of its use as an axe. If such was its mode of hafting, it exhibits a degree of clumsiness and inefficiency very inconsistent with the numerous traces of inventive skill and ingenuity observable in other relics of the same period. The example figured here is from one found in draining a field to the west of Blackford Hill, near Edinburgh. It is of the most common form, and measures 5¾ inches in length.
Class VI. consists of the un-looped Bronze Celt, which is of comparatively rare occurrence in Scotland, though frequently met with in Denmark. It differs only from the more common celt in the absence of the loop; but it is generally of a small size, and is never found of the proportions of the largest British celts.
Class VII.—The Bronze Celt is the most common of all the relics of this period, found of various sizes and degrees of ornament, from the plain small celt of scarcely an inch and half, to those of five and six inches long, fluted, and encircled with mouldings or cable-pattern borders, and ornamented with incised lines and embossed figures on the blade. In Sir Robert Sibbald's Portes, Coloniæ, &c., a Scottish example of the engraved celt is figured, with its blade decorated with the herring-bone pattern, in the same style, and perhaps with the same object as has been assumed for the origin of the incised axe-blades of the period. Examples of engraved celts are of much rarer occurrence than axe-blades, if indeed this one is not unique.[301] The use of the loop so generally attached to the bronze celt, as well as to one class of the palstaves, has been a subject of scarcely less industrious speculation than the probable purpose of the implement itself. The idea which has been repeatedly suggested of its design as a means of securing the celt, as an axe-head, to a bent shaft, is scarcely less unsatisfactory than in the previous class of looped palstaves. If it was used with a thong or cord, the fastening would be so readily exposed to injury, while at the same time it so imperfectly accomplished the object in view, that it appears altogether inconsistent with the general manifestation of ingenuity and skill in the workers in metal to conceive of them adhering to this clumsy device. The unique specimen found at Tadcaster, with an oval bronze ring attached to the loop, and a small ring or bead of jet upon it, so far from confirming such a theory, seems much more consistent with its use as a means of suspension or of securing a number together for convenient deportation.[302]
Such is an attempt to assign a consistent classification and nomenclature to a variety of bronze implements, hitherto most frequently described by British archæologists under the general name of Celts,—a matter perhaps of no very great moment, yet at least calculated to give facility and precision to future descriptions of the discovery of similar objects, and thereby to render such observations of greater avail to the archæologist. They are all more or less applicable to a variety of uses, both as mechanical tools and warlike weapons; and it is not improbable that in entering upon any very nice attempts at discriminating between the various purposes for which they were designed, we shall only ingraft on the products of primitive art a subdivision peculiar to modern civilisation. At a period much nearer our own time the same implement sufficed the Scottish border trooper for table-knife, couteau de chasse, and dagger; and it seems most probable that the older Briton carried the same bronze axe with him to battle with which he waged war against the giant oaks of his native forests. It is a matter worthy of note, however, and calculated to excite in us some surprise, that no bronze axe has yet been discovered, if I mistake not, either in Britain or Ireland, with a perforation through it,—the simplest of all means of securing it to a handle, and one which was already familiar to the workers in stone. The following description might indeed lead to a different conclusion, if we could depend on the strict use of the terms employed:—"On the banks of the Cree, in Galloway, there were several tumuli. In some of these, when they were opened in 1754, there were found the remains of weapons of brass, which were very much corroded. One of these was formed like a halbert; another was shaped like a hatchet, having in the back part an instrument resembling a paviour's hammer. A third was formed like a spade, but of a much smaller size, and each of these weapons had a proper aperture for a handle."[303] Unfortunately the researches of the Scottish archæologist are continually arrested by such tantalizing descriptions, conveyed in vaguest terms, and with no accompanying illustrations to help him to the true character of the objects; leaving him to mourn the apathy of Government, which refuses all aid to those who are striving to arrest such fleeting records of the past, and deposit them, where alone they ought to be, in national museums.
Lever. Pettycur.
Numerous other weapons and implements, of the same metal and character of workmanship, have been found in the Scottish tumuli, or in the chance hoards of bogs or alluvial deposits. Bronze gouges and chisels are among the most common of these, though hitherto apparently less frequently noted in Scotland than in England and Ireland. Of rarer implements of the same era, the bronze crow-bar, or lever, represented in the annexed woodcut, half the length of the original, is, I think, unique. It was found in 1810, in a barrow near Pettycur, Fifeshire, and is now in the collection of the Hon. James Talbot. It is figured in the Archæological Journal, in illustration of Mr. Yates's communication on the use of bronze celts in military operations, and is described as very strong.[304] Its longer end, bent perhaps accidentally, seems intended to be fixed in a stout handle of wood, to which it could be firmly secured by the perforated wings. Mr. Yates adds in describing it:—"The circumstance of its discovery in a barrow is an evidence that it was used for some military purpose, for barrows were not the tombs of agriculturists, gardeners, masons, or carpenters, but of chiefs and warriors." But in making use of such an argument it may be doubted if we are not applying the results of modern civilisation as the standard of primitive ideas. Most probably the greatest chief of the early Bronze Period was in many cases also the best mason, carpenter, and military engineer, and the most skilful worker in metals,—the literal chief, in fact, and true Teutonic king, or most knowing man of his tribe. Perhaps a better argument is to be found in the frequent decoration of the bronze celt. There is a sense of fitness in all minds, and most surely developed in the primitive stages of civilisation, where it acts intuitively, which teaches man to reserve the decorative arts for objects of luxury and pleasurable enjoyment,—then including war and the chase,—but not to expend them on tools of handicraft and implements of toil.[305]
The variety of lance and spear-heads is no less characteristic of the gradual progress of the primitive worker in bronze, from the imitation of the rude types of his obsolete stone weapons, to the production of the large and beautiful myrtle-leaf spear-heads, finished with the most graceful symmetry, and fully equal in character to the finest medieval workmanship. The earliest examples are mere pieces of hammered metal, reduced to the shape of a rude spear-head, but without any socket for attaching them to a shaft. They manifestly belong to the primitive transition-period, in all probability before the northern Briton had learned to smelt or mould the newly introduced metal. Lance and arrow-heads of the same form, or slightly improved by being made somewhat in the shape of the barbed flint arrow-head, are also preserved in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries; and a curious example of the spear-head of the latter type, measuring 10½ inches in length, is engraved in the Archæological Journal.[306] It was found in 1844 by some workmen while dredging in the bed of the Severn, about a mile and a half below Worcester, and is made, like so many others of the simpler forms, of metal of very bright colour and hard quality, in appearance more nearly resembling brass than bronze. Others of the earlier forms of bronze spear-heads are perforated with holes at the broad end, and not unfrequently retain the rivets by which they have been attached to the shaft. A spear-head of this class, in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, measuring 14¾ inches in length, has been secured by three large rivets, two of which still remain. A drawing by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, in the collections of the Society, preserves the figure of another of the same type, but with four rivets, found in a cist on the moor of Sluie, Morayshire, in 1818. A third example, closely resembling the last, and found on the Eildon Hills, Roxburghshire, is in the Abbotsford collection.[307] They have been cast, but obviously by workmen chiefly familiar with the older forms of flint and stone. This class of weapons, or Spear-blades, as they may be termed, is by no means rare.
The earlier implements, chiefly constructed in imitation of the primitive stone models, were intended, for the most part, to be secured to the shaft by means of cords or leather thongs. But the worker in the new material soon learned its capabilities. The hollow socket was speedily superadded, generally accompanied with a projecting middle ridge to strengthen the weapon, and admit of its receiving more readily an acute edge and point. To these again were added the double loops, designed apparently for still further securing it to the shaft; and with this addition the merely useful and essential features may be supposed to terminate, though there is considerable variety in the forms which spear-heads of this class display. The most common and graceful shape might seem to be borrowed from the myrtle leaf. Several are engraved in Gordon's Itinerarium Septentrionale, (Plates L. and LI.,) from the collection of Sir John Clerk of Penicuick, including some interesting varieties. One, of very rude form, and which the author of course styles Roman, was found under a cairn in Galloway. Another, curiously incised with alternate chequers of diamond shape, is described as a hasta pura. A spear-head, decorated in the same style, though with a different pattern, was found near Bilton, Yorkshire, along with a quantity of other bronze weapons, in 1848.[308] But the most singular of all the "several sorts of hastæ or Roman spears," as Gordon delights to call them, is one figured on Plate LI., No. 6, of the Itinerarium, and which may be most fitly described as fiddle-shaped.[309] Neither of these remarkable examples is now to be found in the Penicuick collection. The woodcut represents a spear-head with two loops, which is one of the very commonest forms of the smaller class of Scottish bronze spears, most generally of the bright yellow metal, apparently peculiar to Scotland and Ireland. The other is a singular form of socketed spear, differing from any example I have met with elsewhere. It was found, along with various other bronze weapons and implements, in a moss near Campbeltown, Argyleshire, and is now the property of J. W. Mackenzie, Esq. It measures nearly seven inches in length, by one and a half inch in greatest breadth, and is covered with verd antique.
A very great variety is now discernible in the weapons of the period. The metallurgist had at length mastered the new art, and was rapidly advancing in taste as well as skill. His inventive powers supplied constant novelty in the multiplication of new forms and ornamental devices. The woodcut represents a very fine double-looped spear-head, five and two-fifth inches long, found near the river Dean, Angusshire, and now in the collection of Mr. Bell of Dungannon. Javelin and spear-heads, decorated with similar indented ornaments, have been met with both in Scotland and Ireland. The larger spear-heads also now occur "eyed," as it is termed, or perforated with a variety of ornamental openings, frequently surrounded with a raised border, and otherwise decorated according to the fancy of the designer. Among the broken and half-melted arms dredged out of Duddingstone Loch are numerous fragments of such Eyed Spear-heads, and several very beautiful perfect specimens are preserved in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, as well as at Abbotsford, and in other private collections. They are extremely various in form, exhibiting such a diversity of design even in the simple patterns, as well as of ornamental details in the more elaborate ones, as amply to confirm the idea suggested by so many remains of the bronze period, that these relics were the products of no central manufactory, much less the importation of foreign traders, but were designed and moulded according to the taste and skill of the local artificer, most frequently for his own use. One remarkable feature in the largest and most elaborate of those in the Scottish Museum, represented in the annexed engraving, abundantly confirms the system of classification which gives it place among the later products of the Bronze Period. It measures fully nineteen inches in length, and was found on the lands of Denhead, in the parish of Cupar-Angus, Perthshire, about the year 1831. The bronze, like that of many other works of the same period, is extremely brittle, and the spear-head is broken and imperfect. One of the fractures near the point of the blade shews that a thin rod of iron has been inserted in the centre of the mould to give additional strength to this unusually large weapon, and suffices to connect it with the second transition-period, when the bronze was giving way to the more useful and abundant metal which now nearly supersedes all others in the useful arts. Of the simpler forms of the eyed or perforated spear, one of the most common is pierced with two segmental openings placed opposite to each other, or more rarely disposed irregularly so as to convey somewhat the appearance of an S or ogee perforation. I am indebted to Mr. Albert Way for a sketch of a very fine example of the former type, found at Ardersier Point, Inverness-shire, about 1750. It measures in length fourteen inches by two and three quarters in greatest breadth. This remarkably fine specimen was discovered in a tumulus lying by the side of a human skeleton. A similar spear was found in Northumberland in 1847, along with a bronze sword and other relics, the whole of which are now in the possession of the Hon. H. Liddell. But the eyed spear-head, which is common both in Scotland and Ireland, appears to be of rare occurrence in England, and is, I believe, unknown among the native antiquities of Denmark, though it has been so long the fashion with Scottish and Irish antiquaries to assign to these relics a Scandinavian origin. The Scottish bronze dagger of the same period is almost invariably found to consist of a two-edged blade, tapering to a point, and perforated with two or more holes for attaching a handle to it by means of rivets, but without the simpler, and, as it would seem, more obvious and secure fastening of a prolongation of the broad end of the blade for inserting into a haft. These weapons are also occasionally found elaborately ornamented, according to the prevailing style of the era. They generally retain the bronze rivets, thereby shewing that the handles had been of wood or horn, and not of metal, as is most frequently the case with the swords and daggers of the same era found in Denmark. The annexed figure represents a fine example of the Scottish bronze dagger, found at Pitcaithly, Perthshire, and now in the valuable collection of Mr. Bell of Dungannon. It measures fully six inches in length, by two inches in greatest breadth.
But the most characteristic and beautiful of all the relics of the Bronze Period is the leaf-shaped sword, which has been frequently found with both point and edge as sharp as when it first was used. The examples already referred to, which were found, in 1846, on the south side of Arthur's Seat, near Edinburgh, during the construction of the "Queen's Drive," are equal to any that could be produced. The largest of the two is one of the finest ever found in Scotland, measuring twenty-six and a quarter inches in extreme length, and one and three quarter inches at the broadest part of the blade. The form is exceedingly simple, though graceful and well proportioned; but a small engraving conveys a very imperfect idea of the weapon when held in the hand.[310] The section of the sword shews the art with which it is modelled, so as to secure the indispensable requisite of strength along with a fine edge, the blade swelling in the middle, and tapering off towards the line which runs round the entire blade within the edge. The metal is indeed too soft, apparently, to retain a sharp edge, or to resist the contact with any hard body; but it has been found that when this alloy has been cast into such forms, if the edge be hammered till it begins to crack, and then ground, it acquires a hardness, and takes an edge not greatly inferior to the ordinary kinds of steel. Several of the bronze swords in the Scottish Museum are broken in two, and some of them imperfect, most of such having been found with sepulchral deposits. One of these was discovered, alongside of a cinerary urn, in a tumulus at Memsie, Aberdeenshire. Another was found, lying beside a human skeleton, in a cist under Carlochan Cairn, one of the largest sepulchral cairns in Galloway, which formerly stood on the top of a high hill on the lands of Chappelerne, parish of Crossmichael. It was demolished in the year 1776 for the purpose of furnishing materials to inclose a plantation. From such discoveries we are led to infer that one of the last honours paid to the buried warrior was to break his well-proved weapon and lay it at his side, ere the cist was closed, or the inurned ashes deposited in the grave, and his old companions in arms piled over it the tumulus or memorial cairn. No more touching or eloquent tribute of honour breaks upon us amid the curious records of ages long past. The elf-bolt and the stone axe of the older barrow, speak only of the barbarian anticipation of eternal warfare beyond the grave: of skull-beakers and draughts of bloody wine, such as the untutored savage looks forward to in his dreams of heaven. But the broken sword of the buried chief seems to tell of a warfare accomplished, and of expected rest. Doubtless the future which he anticipated bore faint enough resemblance to the "life and immortality" since revealed to men; but the broken sword speaks in unmistakable language of elevation and progress, and of nobler ideas acquired by the old Briton, when he no longer deemed it indispensable to bear his arms with him to the elysium of his wild creed.
This graceful custom would appear to have been peculiar to Britain, or it has escaped the attention of northern antiquaries. Mr. Worsaae makes no mention of it in describing corresponding Scandinavian weapons, but rather seems to imply the opposite when thus referring to a later period,—"Skilful armourers were then in great request, and although in other cases the Danish warrior would have thought it unbecoming and dangerous to disturb the peace of the dead, he did not scruple to break open a barrow or a grave, if by such means he could obtain the renowned weapon which had been deposited beside the hero who had wielded it."[311] Thus we learn that from the remotest times even to our own day, the northern warrior has esteemed his sword the most sacred emblem of military honour. In later ages the leaders of medieval chivalry gave names to their favoured weapons, the Trobadours celebrated their virtues with all the extravagance of Romaunt fable, and still the soldier's favourite sword is laid on his bier when his comrades bear him to his rest.
Associations with these ancient weapons of an altogether different nature have been suggested, chiefly in consequence of some resemblance of the indented mouldings on the bronze swords to the ribs and grooves frequently found on the modern Malay Creess. The design of the latter, it is well known, is to retain poison, and it has been supposed, not without some appearance of evidence, that such practices were not unknown to the ancient Caledonian. This has been already referred to as the purpose which perhaps first suggested those rude incised lines on the earlier axe-blades, afterwards turned to account as a means of tasteful decoration. In the ancient Irish poem on the death of Oscar, printed in the first volume of the Royal Irish Academy's Transactions, the spear of Cærbre is said to be poisoned, seemingly in no figurative sense. The era of the bronze sword is of an earlier date; but notwithstanding the graceful symbolism apparent in some of the sepulchral rites, we have little reason for assuming that there was anything in the degree of civilisation attained by the Briton of that period incompatible with such savage practices.
Fewer primitive relics of armour or of personal covering have been found than of weapons of war, as might naturally be expected among a people whose partial civilisation could not so far have overcome the natural habits acquired in the chase and the sudden foray, as to induce them to cumber themselves with any great amount of defensive accoutrements. Skins and furs no doubt formed their chief articles of clothing and protection, and moreover, abundantly admitted of the degree of ornament which the taste indicated in the decoration of their weapons would lead them to aim at.
Helmets or head pieces of any kind belonging to the native Pagan era are of extremely rare occurrence. In a tumulus at Drimnamucklach, Argyleshire, pieces of a rudely adorned bronze helmet were found, and are now in the possession of Mr. Campbell, the proprietor of the estate. Gordon describes another example found in a cairn, near the water of Cree, Galloway, but it was so cracked and brittle, and probably also so rudely handled, that it fell to pieces on being removed.[312] There is every reason to believe that this piece of defensive armour was not generally used among the native Britons, nor indeed among the Scandinavian warriors of the Bronze Period. Only one imperfect fragment of a bronze helmet exists in the ample collections of the Christiansborg Palace at Copenhagen. Diodorus refers to the brazen helmet of the Gauls, but both Herodian and Xiphiline speak of the Britons as destitute of this defensive head-piece. Their matted locks, which they decorated with the large and massive hair-pins of gold, silver, or bronze, so frequently found with other relics, sufficed them alike for protection and ornament. This custom was probably common to all the northern races. But the indispensable defensive armour of the old British warrior was his shield, frequently made entirely of bronze or of wood covered with metal, and sometimes adorned with plates of silver and even gold.
Bronze Buckler, Ayrshire.
The ancient bronze shield is of common occurrence both in Britain and Ireland, and forms one of the most ingenious specimens of primitive metallurgic art. In 1780 a singular group of five or six bronze bucklers was discovered in a peat moss, six or seven feet below the surface, on the farm of Luggtonrigge, near Giffin Castle, Ayrshire. The shields were regularly disposed in a circle, and one of them, which passed into the possession of Dr. Ferris, was subsequently presented by him to the Society of Antiquaries of London. It has a semi-globular umbo, surrounded by twenty-nine concentric rows of small studs, with intervening ribs, and measures 26¾ inches in diameter.[313] Like all the primitive British bucklers, it will be seen that it was designed to be held in the hand, the raised umbo in the centre being hollow to receive and protect the hand where it grasped the cross bar, seen on the under side in the annexed engraving. The central umbo is surrounded with a series of rings of bronze set with small studs, and the two pins seen on the inner side have perhaps secured a strap for suspending it to the neck of the wearer when not in use. In 1837 two remarkably fine bronze shields of this description were exhibited to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland by Mr. George Wauchope of Niddry, which were found near Yetholm, about eight miles from Kelso, at a depth of four feet, by a labourer engaged in digging a drain. Sir Robert Sibbald describes among Scottish antiquities obtained on the sites of ancient camps, "pieces of harness of brass: some for the arms and some for the legs. Shields also are found; some oblong and oval, and some orbicular. Some of these are of brass and some of wood full of brass nails."[314] It is probable that many of the shields of the same period were made chiefly of wood and leather, with the central umbo of bronze; the latter being occasionally discovered alone in barrows. In the circular Highland target, which is still to be met with among collected relics of the clans, we find a curious example of the imitation of the earlier model of the Bronze Period. Though the Roman example of wearing the shield on the arm has been followed by the Scottish mountaineer, rendering the hollow umbo no longer of use, yet it appears to the last in the boss of his target, furnishing another striking proof of the unreasoning tenacity with which the Celtic races are found to cling to ancient customs.
Among the specimens of defensive armour preserved in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, are two pieces of thin copper, decorated with indented ornaments, which were presented to the Society by Sir George Mackenzie of Coull, Bart., in 1828. They are described by the donor as pieces of copper, supposed to be plate armour, or the covering of a shield, found in a cairn, under an oak tree at Craigdarroch, Ross-shire. Various other portions were found along with these, and their appearance seems fully to justify the supposition of the donor. In the autumn of 1849 a remarkable discovery of bronze arms and other antiquities was made in the Isle of Skye. They included swords, spear-heads, celts, and a bronze pin with a hollow cup-shaped head similar to one figured in the Archæological Journal, a relic of one of the Irish Crannoges, or island strengths.[315] A gold armilla and other ornaments of the same precious metal are also said to have been obtained along with these ancient remains, and beside them lay the fragments of an oaken chest in which the whole appeared to have been deposited. The most of these valuable relics were secured by Lord Macdonald, but one curious and probably unique implement fell into private hands, and has since been deposited in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries. In general appearance it resembles a bent spear-head; but it has a raised central ridge on the inside, while it is nearly plain and smooth on the outer side. It has a hollow socket, and is perforated with holes for securing it to a handle by means of a pin. The most probable use for which it has been designed would seem to be for scraping out the interior of canoes and other large vessels made from the trunk of the oak. But we necessarily reason from very imperfect data when we ascribe a specific purpose to the implements of a period the arts and habits of which must have differed so essentially from our own.
Another class of bronze implements not uncommon in Ireland, and occasionally mentioned among those discovered in Scotland, includes what are generally described as reaping or pruning-hooks. One of these, which was found at a depth of six feet in a bog in the neighbourhood of Ballygawley, county of Tyrone, now preserved in the British Museum, is figured in the Archæological Journal.[316] Another engraved in General Vallancey's Collectanea,[317] is described as "a small securis, called by the Irish a searr, to cut herbs, acorns, mistletoe, &c." About the year 1790, a similar instrument was discovered at Ledberg, in the county of Sutherland, by some labourers cutting peats, and was pronounced by the Earl of Bristol, then Bishop of Derry, to whom it was presented, to be a Druidical pruning-hook, similar to several found in England.[318] Perhaps among the same relics of primitive agricultural skill ought also to be reckoned a curious weapon or implement of bronze, occasionally found in Scotland, two examples of which are figured here. One of them is from the original in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries. It was found among the remains of many large oak trees, on the farm of Rottenmoss or Moss-side, in the vicinity of Crossraguel Abbey, Argyleshire, and is not inaptly described by its donor as nearly resembling one of the common forms of the Malay Creess. It measures fourteen inches in length. The other and more finished implement of the same kind is in the collection formed by the distinguished Scottish antiquary, Sir John Clerk, at Penicuick House. It is furnished with a hollow shaft or socket for the handle. The same interesting and valuable collection includes other specimens of this primitive implement, constructed like that in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, with only a metal spike for insertion into the haft. Some examples of this relic of old agricultural skill are of extremely small dimensions, measuring only from six to eight inches in the length of the blade, and should perhaps more correctly be described as pruning-hooks or knives. But in this, as in so many other attempts to assign a use to obsolete implements, the most probable suggestions of their original purpose are at best but guesses after the truth.
