Among the earliest definite forms of Northern art, the serpent or dragon is the most common subject adopted for direct imitation, or as a suggestive basis for the play of fancy, by the primitive artist. The woodcut represents a singular bronze ornament in the Museum of the Scottish Antiquaries, the history of which is uncertain, though its style of workmanship completely accords with that of other well-known native relics. It is figured about one-third the size of the original. The protuberances on the snake-formed bracelets and other relics, evidently designed originally to represent the scales of the serpent, appear to have latterly become a conventional ornament, and are to be found on bronze relics unaccompanied by any more defined features of the snake or dragon. The annexed woodcut represents a very curious bronze relic in the Scottish Museum, whereon the triple snakelike form and scales are represented, but without the head or any more distinct characteristic of the reptile. It measures five inches in its greatest diameter, exclusive of the projecting scale-like ornaments. The exact locality where it was found has not been noted; but another example in the same collection, a little smaller in size, is believed to have been dug up in Argyleshire. It measures externally four and four-fifths inches in greatest diameter. Its most probable use is as a decoration of the arm, or possibly as a neck ornament; but it is quite inflexible, and if worn on the neck must have been permanently affixed to the inheritor of this cumbrous badge of honour. The larger of the two, which is figured here, weighs fully two pounds avoirdupois.
D. McInnes. Delt.
W. Douglas. Sculpt.
BRONZE BEADED TORC, (Lochar Moss.)
and
BROOCH OF LORN.
Of the commoner forms of torcs, head-rings, armlets, and other personal ornaments of this period, examples are not rare in Scotland, though the want of any efficient system for securing them from destruction, when of the precious metals, or of being buried in private collections and almost as effectually lost for nearly all useful purposes, renders it difficult to obtain accurate accounts of the great majority of discoveries. Some of the simpler bronze torcs and head-rings have already been described among the relics of the Archaic Period. But one of the most beautiful neck ornaments ever found in Scotland is a beaded torc discovered by a labourer while cutting turf in Lochar Moss, Dumfriesshire, about two miles to the north of Cumlongan Castle; and exhibited by Mr. Thomas Gray of Liverpool at the York Meeting of the Archæological Institute. It is engraved on Plate III., along with the bronze vessel in which it was inclosed. The beads, which measure rather more than an inch in diameter, are boldly ribbed and grooved longitudinally. Between every two ribbed beads there is a small flat one formed like the wheel of a pulley, or the vertebral bone of a fish. The portion which must have passed round the nape of the neck is flat and smooth on the inner edge, but chased on the upper side in an elegant incised pattern corresponding to the ornamentation already described as characteristic of this period, and bearing some resemblance to that on the beautiful bronze diadem found at Stitchel in Roxburghshire, figured on a subsequent page. The beads are disconnected, having apparently been strung upon a metal wire, as was the case in another example found in the neighbourhood of Worcester. A waved ornament chased along the outer edge of the solid piece seems to have been designed in imitation of a cord; the last tradition, as it were, of the string with which the older necklace of shale or jet was secured. Altogether this example of the class of neck ornaments to which Mr. Birch has assigned the appropriate name of Beaded Torcs, furnishes an exceedingly interesting illustration of the development of imitative design, in contradistinction to the more simple and archaic funicular torc, which, though continued in use down to a late period, pertains to the epoch of primitive art.
Various other personal ornaments have been discovered in Scotland, manifestly belonging to this later era when artistic design had been fully developed, and its works were characterized by a well-defined style. Of one of the most remarkable of these a drawing has fortunately been preserved, made to illustrate a communication to the Scottish Society of Antiquaries in 1787, though the original, it is to be feared, must no longer be sought for. The cairn in which the relic was found is thus described: "At Cluinmore, near Blair-Atholl, there is a beautiful green cairn, called Sithain-na-Cluana, i.e., the Fairy Hill of Clune. It is about twenty paces high obliquely, and about one hundred and twenty paces in circumference. Upon the top of it there are the two side stones of the altar still remaining, upon which there are engraven some hieroglyphics, so much defaced that they are not readable unless the stones were turned over and narrowly examined."[493] A rough square outline is marked, "the urn, now open, 1½ ft. long;" and following it is the sketch, of which the annexed woodcut is an exact copy, of the same size. It is described as the "Large bronze ring found in the cairn of Clunemore." Rings of a similar character to this, though differing greatly in their details, have been frequently found in Denmark, and various fine examples are preserved in the valuable collection at Copenhagen. But the most remarkable feature of this very curious relic is the hooded snake's head which terminates one of the ends, the other having been most probably finished in like manner. It appears to have almost exactly corresponded to those on the large snake bracelet found near Findhorn, and like it seems to have been jewelled. Objects of this class are named by the Danish antiquaries, Rings for the Hair. A comparison of this example, with one engraved in Mr. Thom's edition of Mr. Worsaae's Primeval Antiquities, (p. 34,) will best illustrate their general resemblance, and the very marked difference of their details. Whether we assume it to have been designed as an ornament for the head or the neck, the Clunemore ring, with its singular snake-head finials, could not fail to prove a very striking article of personal adornment. Besides these hair-rings, the Danish tumuli furnish numerous gold and bronze bands, diadem and coronet shaped ornaments, and other head-dresses, nothing similar to which are known in this country. Various examples of these are engraved both by Lord Ellesmere and Mr. Worsaae, including a very remarkable one figured in the Primeval Antiquities, which was found a few years since in the neighbourhood of Haderslev, and has an inscription engraved on the inner side, in Runic characters, supposed to denote the name of the original possessor. Other rings which occur among Scandinavian sepulchral deposits are classified by Danish antiquaries among articles supposed to have been connected with Pagan worship. These include several varieties of penannular rings not greatly differing in general form from the British gold relics already described under that name. But besides these there are others of a much larger size, one of which, figured by Mr. Worsaae, is described as "a large ring or girdle of massive gold mixed with silver, which is rivetted together in the middle of the front, and is conceived to have been the ornament of an idol; for it can scarcely be supposed that any human being could have constantly worn such a ring."[494]
Ring for Hair. Cairn of Clunemore.