Fig. 540.
Harty. ½
The decoration of the surfaces of bronze implements by sunk, and in some cases by raised lines appears to have been effected, not as a rule by any method of engraving, but by means of punches, as already described in Chapter III. I have in that chapter accidentally omitted to mention two decorated bronze celts which have been figured and described by Mr. Llewellynn Jewitt, F.S.A.[1747] They were both found at a place called Highlow, in the High Peak of Derbyshire, about two miles from Hathersage, and are in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire. There seems some reason to believe[1748] that the celts were found in a barrow accompanied by burnt bones and pottery. One of them (6¾ inches) is flat and ornamented with lines of slightly impressed chevrons running along it. The other (6¼ inches) is flanged and ornamented with a similar herring-bone pattern, which in this instance ends in a row of triangles near the edge of the celt. In some few cases the patterns may have been engraved, and I find on trial that there is no difficulty in engraving such parallel lines as are frequently seen on dagger blades by means of a flake of flint. Such an instrument suffers but little by wear, and by means of a ruler, either straight or curved, there is no difficulty in engraving lines of the required character in the bronze, though the lines are hardly so smooth as if made with a chisel-edged punch.
Notches which would assist in the breaking off of superfluous pieces of metal, such as the runners in the moulds, can readily be made with flint flakes used as saws.
For smoothing the surface of bronze instruments flint scraping-tools are not so efficient, as they are liable to “chatter” and to leave an uneven and scratched surface, much inferior to one produced by friction with a gritty rubber.
There remains little more to be said with regard to the manufacture of the ancient bronze tools and weapons. It may, however, be observed that the processes of hammering-out and sharpening the edges were employed not only by those who first made the instruments, but also by the subsequent possessors. Many tools, such for instance as palstaves, like Fig. 65, were no doubt originally much longer in the blade than they are at present, and have in the course of use either been broken and again drawn down and sharpened, or have been actually worn away and “stumped up” by constant repetition of these processes. The recurved ends of the lunate cutting edges of many such instruments are also due to repeated hammering-out. In some instances the broken part of one instrument has been converted into another form—as, for example, a fragment of a broken sword into a knife or dagger, or a palstave that has lost its cutting end, into a hammer.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHRONOLOGY AND ORIGIN OF BRONZE.