Another pin, of much the same fashion, 12½ inches long, also has the point curved. The bulging portion is in this instance nearer the head, which, moreover, has a piece of amber set in it, and there is a small loop on the side of the pin, as in Fig. 457, instead of a hole through the bulging part. This specimen was found in a mine near the river Fowey,[1427] at a depth of ten fathoms from the surface, when a new work was begun for searching after tin ore.
The long pin already mentioned as found in a barrow near Lewes[1428] has an expanded head with a boss upon it, and about 4 inches below, an ornamented lozenge-shaped plate, beneath which is a small loop for attachment.
Large pins of the same character have been found in the Lake-dwellings of France, Switzerland, and Italy.
| Fig. 455. Scratchbury. 1/1 | Fig. 456. Camerton. ⅔ |
A large bronze pin, 13½ inches long, found on Salisbury Plain,[1429] is described as having a flattened head, ornamented on one side with a pattern. This which is now in the British Museum is, however, of the late Celtic Period.
It is by no means impossible that these larger and heavier pins may at times have served as piercing-tools and even as weapons. The stiletto survives as a ladies’ piercing-tool, but no one at the present day would “his quietus make with a bare bodkin;” though there was probably a time when both stiletto and bodkin served a double purpose, and were used, as occasion might require, either as weapons or as tools.
Smaller pins, ornamented at the blunt end, have not unfrequently been found.
A fragment of one discovered by Sir R. Colt Hoare in a barrow at Scratchbury, is engraved in his unpublished plate, and has also been figured by Dr. Thurnam, F.S.A.,[1430] in his memoir so often quoted. It is here reproduced as Fig. 455. Another from a barrow at Camerton,[1431] Somerset, has a hollow spheroidal head, with a double perforation. The head and upper part of the stem are decorated with parallel rings and oblique hatching, as may be seen in Fig. 456. In character this pin much resembles some of those from the Swiss Lake-dwellings.
A very similar pin was obtained from a barrow near Firle,[1432] Sussex, by Dr. Mantell.