There have been in this country a few instances of the discovery of bronze rings in company with palstaves and socketed celts, and these rings may possibly have served a similar purpose, though it must be confessed that such an use is purely conjectural. That shown in Fig. 188 was found in company with a bronze palstave without a loop, but much like Fig. 74, at Winwick,[548] near Warrington, Lancashire, and was kindly lent me by Dr. James Kendrick, who in 1858[549] suggested that it was a “sort of ferrule to put round the handle of the palstave to prevent the wood from splitting when the instrument was struck.” The ornament on the ring, somewhat like the “broad arrow” of modern times, is of much the same character as the shield-like pattern below the stop-ridge of some palstaves. In the British Museum is a stone mould from Northumberland for flat rings, 3 inches in diameter, and for flat celts; but such rings probably served some other purpose.
Fig. 188.—Winwick. ½
Another bronze ring, 1⅔ inches in diameter, was found with a socketed celt in the Thames,[550] opposite Somerset House, but here the actual association of the two is doubtful.
I have already expressed a doubt whether the celt from Tadcaster, Yorkshire, and now in the British Museum, had, when found, the bronze ring with a jet bead upon it passing through the loop. The ring itself is made not of one continuous piece of metal, but of stout wire, with the ends abutting against each other, and nothing would be easier for the workman who found the three objects than to pass the ring through the loop of the celt and the hole of the bead. I have myself received from Hungary two socketed celts, each having imperfect penannular bracelets passed through the loop in the same manner, though they certainly had no original connection with the celts. It is, however, but right to mention that in the British Museum is the upper part of a celt with an octagonal neck, found with other objects near Kensington, on the loop of which is a small ring, barely large enough to encircle the loop. Of what service this could have been it is difficult to imagine.
If the association of the larger rings and the celts must be given up, it is needless to cite the opinions which have been held as to the use of the one in connection with the other. Some references are given in the note.[551]
The early Iron Age of Denmark is no doubt considerably later in date than that of Hallstatt, but in several of the discoveries of objects of that period in Denmark socketed celts of iron have been found still attached to their helves. In the Nydam find[552], described by Mr. Conrad Engelhardt, the majority of the axes were of the ordinary form, with eyes for the shafts; but there were some also of the form of the socketed celt, though without any loops. These were mounted as axes, and not as adzes, on crooked handles about 17 inches long. The helves of axes of the ordinary form were from 23 to 32 inches in length. In the Vimose find[553] there were several of these iron celts, one of which was thought to have been mounted on a crooked handle, but the others appear to have been mounted as chisels.
The palstaves with the edges transverse to the septum between the side flanges seem to have been mounted in precisely the same manner as those of the ordinary form, except that when attached to their handles they formed adzes, and not axes. It has been suggested[554] that the palstaves of the ordinary form may also have been mounted as adzes, and probably this was so in some exceptional cases. Mention has already been made of some Italian helves with transverse notches for the reception of the blade. Some of the flat celts may have also been mounted as adzes by binding them against the shorter end of an L-shaped handle, in the same manner as the Egyptians fixed their adze blades.
In some palstaves, but more especially in those of the South of Europe, there is at the butt-end of the blade a kind of dovetailed notch, which appears to have been formed by hammering over a part of the jets or runners of the original castings, which were left projecting a short distance instead of being broken off short at the blade. Whether the hammering over was for the purpose of rounding the angles or for that of forming this dovetailed notch is somewhat uncertain; it is, however, possible that one or more pins or rivets may have been driven through the handle, so as to catch the dovetails and retain the blade in its place. It is not often the case that this portion of the blade is so long that it would have gone through the handle and have allowed of a pin beyond it, as suggested by Mr. Dunoyer[555] in the case of a long palstave, with a rivet-hole near the butt-end of the blade. A palstave, found in a tomb in the department of Loir et Cher,[556] by my friend the late Abbé Bourgeois, is provided with a rivet-hole near the top, counter-sunk on either side so as to guide a pin into the place intended for it; and it seems probable, as the Abbé suggests, that this was connected with the securing of the blade, which is destitute of a loop, to the helve. Of six thin flat bronze celts, 7 or 8 inches long, from the Island of Thermia,[557] or Cythnos, in the Greek Archipelago, which are now in the British Museum, three that are broad are provided with square or lozenge-shaped holes towards the upper end of the blade, and three that are narrower are without. A flanged celt from Italy,[558] 6 inches long, has a circular hole in the same position, which may have received a pin. Some contrivance for keeping blades of smooth bronze fast in their handles must have been necessary or desirable from the earliest times. With stone celts we often find that the butt-end destined to be let into the wooden or horn socket was purposely roughened. With bronze, however, such a process does not seem to have been adopted to any extent; and probably with blades of bronze, so much less tapering than those of stone, the difficulty of keeping them in place was surmounted by attaching them with some sort of resinous or pitchy cement. A safe remedy against slipping out was no doubt found in the addition of the ring or loop to the side, which there can be but little doubt served for a cord to pass through, so as to hold the blade back to the handle. In a socketed celt, 5½ inches long, found in the Seine, at Paris, and now in my own collection, not only is the wood preserved in the socket by saturation with some salt of copper, but within the upper part of the loop there are distinct traces of a cord which was apparently formed of vegetable fibre. The Irish palstave, Fig. 105, with the curved projection instead of the usual loop, seems to show that it was only against the upper part of the loop that the strain came. No doubt, however, there was more strength in the loop attached to the blade at both ends than in the mere neb or projection. Some Italian socketed celts have similar projecting nebs, one on either side. In the case of the palstaves and celts with two loops, it seems probable that the handle must have been somewhat prolonged beyond the side branch, which received the palstave or went into the socket of the celt.