Bone Pins, &c., from Lake-dwellings in Counties Sligo, Leitrim, and Roscommon (scale, about one-third).
The larger crannogs, like those of Ballinderry, Lagore, and Lough Gur, were of the character of fortresses, differing in little, except in position, from the dun or cahir on land. Their ‘kitchen-middens,’ when examined, brought forth exactly the same class of remains—stone, flint, bronze, iron, bone, wood, and glass. A peculiarity of the ‘finds,’ in connection with the greater islands, was the enormous quantity of animal remains, often amounting to hundreds of tons, with which the stockades were found surrounded. These usually consisted of the bones of the bos longifrons and bos frontosis, of the cervus elaphus, or red deer, wild boars, horses, asses, sheep, foxes, wolf-dogs, and occasionally of human beings. Intermixed with the osseous débris of crannogs, very frequently occur numerous articles of early manufacture—pottery, swords, spear-heads, battle-axes, knives, chains and fetters, spears, reaping-hooks, saws, gouges, brooches, whorls, small frying-pans and pots, horse-furniture, crucibles, beads—of jet, of glass, and of amber; combs, tweezers, pins and needles.
Glass Beads, from Lake-dwellings.
Comb, from Lagore Lake-dwelling.
Comb, from Ballinderry Lake-dwelling.
Few ornaments or other articles formed of gold or silver have been found in Irish crannogs. There is also an absence of coins, except those of very late date, the celebrated ‘brass money,’ from the mints of James the Second, being the most common. Such coins had probably belonged to outlaws or rapparees, who, after the downfall of the Stuart cause, were compelled to live in places difficult of access, and had sought the ancient crannogs as exceptionally safe retreats.
