It is to this expedition that I attribute the two swords already described, as indeed was suggested some years ago by Professor Peet.[383] One is unquestionably of Type D, the type which has been most commonly found in Greek lands, while the other seems, as far as can be judged from its damaged hilt, to be also of the same type. The latter is engraved with the name of Seti II., who reigned from 1209 to 1205 B.C., and so cannot be later than the latter date. It is probable that it was a souvenir of the raid of 1220 B.C., upon which Seti placed his name some ten to fifteen years later.

Thus Type D was in use in 1220 B.C., and must have developed earlier, for we must allow some years to have elapsed since the “Achæans” left the Danube basin for Greek lands, a few more before many of them had established themselves as kings, and a further interval before they can have organised a piratical expedition on a sufficiently extensive scale to threaten the safety of Egypt. Fifteen years would be the shortest possible time for such a succession of events, thirty years more likely. So we may consider that some of these intruders left the Danube basin about 1250 B.C. Now it must have been about this time, or rather earlier, that the Briges, from the north of Macedonia, crossed the Hellespont into Asia Minor, where they became known as Phrygians. This movement appears to have been one of a succession of similar raids, which carried the Thraco-Phrygian people from the Danube basin eastwards. It seems probable that our “Achæan” intruders were part of this body, who, instead of moving on to the east, had passed southwards in search of adventure.

Type G, as we have seen, has been found at the famous cemetery at Hallstatt, in some of the older graves. This cemetery is believed to date, at the earliest, from 900 B.C., but iron was found in most of the graves, and the bronze swords were few in number, and from graves in which no iron was found. We may safely conclude that these swords belong to the very beginning of this period, and had been in use for some time previously.

It is always a difficult matter to determine how long a given type of implement or weapon remained in use. Besides this we must allow for overlapping, that is to say for the period during which a type still survived in use after its successor, which was doubtless in many ways its superior, had been designed. I am inclined to believe that about twenty-five years is sufficient to allow for this overlap, though possibly on rare occasions an obsolete weapon may have been preserved longer, especially as a trophy or memento.

If we allow a period of one hundred years between the introduction of one type and the first use of its successor, we shall be able to fit the two ascertained dates, and this period seems on the whole reasonable. Types A and B are, however, scarce in Central Europe, though Type B seems, in a modified form, to have persisted longer in the Baltic region. I propose, therefore, to reduce the hundred years to fifty in each of these cases.

Such a chronological scheme is, of necessity, provisional, and must be susceptible of modification as further synchronisms are worked out, but on the evidence at present available, I am inclined to think that it is not far from the truth, and that any amendments which may have to be made in the future will scarcely exceed fifty years either way. This scheme is for Central Europe only, and may be true also for Italy and Greece. Various modifications may, however, have to be made in applying it to more distant regions, especially in the north and west, such as Brittany, the British Isles and the Scandinavian countries.

Type A Transitional . . . . 1500–1425
Type B Semi-circular . . . . 1450–1375
Type C Oval . . . . 1400–1275
Type D Mycenæ, Fucino . . . . 1300–1175
Type E Wilburton . . . . 1200–1075
Type F Proto-Hallstatt, Dowris . . . . 1100– 975
Type G Hallstatt . . . . 1000– 875