Although socketed celts, with distinct curved wings upon their faces, are probably the earliest of their class, yet it is impossible to say to how late a period the curved lines, which eventually became the representatives of the wings, may not have come down. This form of ornamentation was certainly in use at the same time as other forms, as we know from the hoards in which socketed celts of different patterns have been found together. As has already been recorded, the socketed form has also been frequently found associated with palstaves, especially with those of the looped variety.
The form of the tapering socket varies considerably, the section being in some instances round or oval, and in other cases presenting every variety of form between these and the square or rectangular. There is usually some form of moulding or beading round the mouth of the celt, below which the body before expanding to form the edge is usually round, oval, square, rectangular, or more or less regularly hexagonal or octagonal. The decorations generally consist of lines, pellets, and circles, cast in relief upon the faces, and much more rarely on the sides. Not unfrequently there is no attempt at decoration beyond the moulding at the top. The socketed celts are, almost without exception, devoid of ornaments produced by punches or hammer marks, such as are so common on the solid celts and palstaves. This may be due to their being more liable to injury from blows owing to the thinness of the metal and to their being hollow. They are nearly always provided with a loop at one side, though some few have been cast without loops. These are usually of small size, and were probably used as chisels rather than as hatchets. A very few have a loop on each side.
The types are so various that it is hard to make any proper classification of them. I shall, therefore, take them to a certain extent at hazard, keeping those, however, together which most nearly approximate to each other. I begin with a specimen showing in a very complete manner the raised wings already mentioned.
| Fig. 110.—High Roding. ½. | Fig. 111.—Dorchester, Oxon. ½. |
This instrument formed part of a hoard of celts and fragments of metal found at High Roding, Essex, and now in the British Museum, and is represented in Fig. 110. With it was one with two raised pellets beneath the moulding round the mouth, and one with three longitudinal ribs. The others were plain.
Another (4 inches), with a treble moulding at the top, from Wateringbury, Kent, was in the Douce and Meyrick Collections, and is now also in the British Museum.
I have a German celt of this type, but without the pellets, found in Thuringia. Others are engraved by Lindenschmit,[392] Montelius,[393] and Chantre.[394] I have a good example from Lutz (Eure et Loir).
On many French celts the wings are shown by depressed lines or grooves on the faces. I have specimens from a hoard found at Dreuil, near Amiens, and from Lusancy, near Rheims. Others with the curved lines more or less distinct have been found in various parts of France.
There is an example from Maulin in the Museum at Namur, and a Dutch example is in the Museum at Assen.