In the celt shown in Fig. 7 the flanges are very slight, and are in all probability merely due to the hammering necessary to produce the kind of cable pattern or spiral fluting which is seen in the side view. The faces taper in each direction from a transverse ridge, and the blade for some distance below this is ornamented with an incuse chevron pattern. The blade towards the edge and above the ridge is left plain. This specimen was found in Suffolk, but I do not know the exact locality. It is in my own collection.
Fig. 7.—Suffolk. ½
Among nineteen bronze celts discovered about the year 1845 on the property of Mr. Samuel Ware, F.S.A., at Postlingford Hall,[188] near Clare, Suffolk, were several of this class, two of which (6½ and 5½ inches), now in the British Museum, are figured in the Archæologia. One of them is ornamented with a chevron pattern, covering the part of the blade usually decorated, and having vertical lines running through the centres of the chevrons, and through the junction of their bases. The other is ornamented with a series of curved parallel lines running across the blade, as on Fig. 16. They have a slight projection or ridge at the thickest part of the blade, as have also two that are not ornamented, which likewise were presented by Mr. Ware to the British Museum.
Another celt of this kind (4⅞ inches) was found with a bronze spear-head having loops at the lower part of the blade in the Kilcot Wood,[189] near Newent, Gloucestershire. The faces are ornamented with parallel rows of short diagonal lines, bounded at the lower end by a double series of dots, and a transverse row of diagonal lines.
In the remarkable hoard of bronze instruments discovered on Arreton Down, in the Isle of Wight, about the year 1735, were, besides the spear-heads and dagger blades, of which mention will be made in subsequent chapters, four of these flanged celts. Of these one (6⅞ inches) was ornamented both on the face and sides, but is at present only known from a drawing in an album belonging to the Society of Antiquaries.
Fig. 8.—Arreton Down. ½
The others were plain, and of one of them a woodcut is given in the Archæologia,[190] which by the permission of the Council of the Society of Antiquaries is here reproduced as Fig. 8. It is 8 inches in length, and is one of the largest of its class in the British Museum. As will be seen, the blade itself is of the doubly tapering kind. The others are 4½ and 4¾ inches long. They are said to have been found arranged in regular order,[191] and, as Mr. Franks has suggested, may possibly have been the store deposited by some ancient founder, which he was unable to reclaim from its hiding-place.