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.
Fig. 412.—Lurgan. ¼ — Fig. 413.—Ireland. ½ — Fig. 414.—Antrim. ½
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]