The typical form of neck ring and arm ring (Figs. [64], [65]), which is associated with the bulbous brooches in these hoards, composed of hammered rods and intertwisted wires of silver plaited manifoldly, and formed into a circlet by soldering the ends, does not occur again in Scotland. But it has obvious relations with a group of personal ornaments in gold, which present similar features of form and construction. They are of smaller size than the silver rings, all that are known being obviously finger-rings.
Fig. 86.—Gold Rings found at Stenness (actual size).
Two of these (Fig. 86, Nos. 2 and 3) were dug up in the month of August 1879, in a field near the shore of the Loch of Stenness, in Orkney, and are now in the National Museum. The largest is formed of two double twists of gold wires, hammered round, and tapering to the small ends, which are connected by a lozenge-shaped bezel. The smaller of the two is composed of three strands of gold wire, similarly shaped by the hammer alone, and intertwisted, and the small ends soldered together. With them there were also found two plain flat hoops or circlets of gold, of about an inch in diameter, ¼ inch wide in the widest part, and tapering to the ends, which are unjoined (Fig. 86, No. 1).
There is also in the Museum a hoard of gold objects of this character, consisting of six finger-rings of plaited wires, a plain solid ring formed of a tapering rod (Fig. [87]), with the ends unjoined, two portions of plaited rings cut off, and two portions of plain solid rings similarly cut. Two of the plaited rings (one of which is shown in Fig. [87]) are formed of three wires each, intertwisted, and the ends soldered together; the wires or rods are simply rounded by the hammer and tapered to either end. The other four rings are slightly larger. They are composed of eight wires, each similarly fashioned by the hammer alone, and ingeniously interplaited, so that two strands of the plait form a ridge all round the convexity of the ring, the ends united and worked flat to form a bezel. Unfortunately we are unable to localise this hoard more closely than that it was found somewhere in the Hebrides.
Fig. 87.—Gold Rings found in the Hebrides (actual size).
Fig. 88.—Ingot of Silver (actual size).
Another hoard of somewhat similar character was found in June 1863, in the island of Bute, about 300 yards distant from the old church of St. Blane, in Kingarth. The hoard,