Byways in British Archaeology

by Walter Johnson

Reverting for a moment to the subject of fire-kindlers, I would remark that many of the objects known to archaeologists as flint “scrapers” were probably ignition agents[729]. Consequently, to call such flints “thumb-scrapers,” or oval scrapers, as is often done by the barrow-digger, is to push aside a debateable question by means of an assumption. Scrapers they may have been, but it is at least permissible to believe that they were also fire-producers. In due time, the strike-a-light became a specialized article, but both scraper and fire-kindler continued to find a place in the grave. Pliny speaks of the discovery of mirrors and “body-scrapers” (specula quoque, et strigiles)[730], in ancient tombs. These strigils, which Philemon Holland quaintly renders “currycombes[731],” and Littré, as instruments pour les oreilles[732], were actually, in Roman days, the scrapers of horn or metal, used by the bather to remove impurities from the skin. Thus, considered as a scraper, the strigil reaches back to the rounded flint with trimmed edges, and forward to the Mediaeval “sleeker” of stone or metal, employed by the currier in tawing hides. As a “slick-stone” of black glass, degraded, doubtless, to the ornamental stage, the object again appears in Islay, associated with a burial of the Viking period[733]. Later records of the scraper, and of the strike-a-light, definitely illustrative of the theory of funeral gifts, seem to be lacking.

A survival of the custom of furnishing the dead with fire-kindlers is partially traceable in the ancient practice of depositing a candle in the grave, to light the dead man on his way. In Ireland a hammer was also interred, to enable the deceased person to knock at the gates of Purgatory, while a sixpenny piece secured admission[734]. Within the last generation a native of Cleveland was buried with a candle for the purpose of obtaining light, a bottle of wine for nourishment, and a penny to pay the ferryman[735]. The village of Bucklebury, Berkshire, by the way, supplies an instance of a different kind; in a grave apparently modern, two bottles of beer had been placed but no candle[736]! In Lincolnshire a groat, “a mug and a jug,” were placed in the coffin. The Lincolnshire widow, who had forgotten to deposit the mug and the jug in the grave, broke the crockery, as we have seen ([p. 292] supra), and laid the fragments on the mound. In one case, where a bottle, full of pins, was found in a recently opened grave, the explanation can probably be found in sympathetic magic. The pins had been used to touch warts on the skin, and the operative belief was either that the warts were transferred to the dead person, or that, as the pins rusted, the warts would die away. The former explanation is the more likely, else the pins might as well have been buried anywhere. Mr England Howlett asserts that the burial of a candle in the coffin was once common. He throws doubt on the theory of the provision of light for the dead, and claims that the candle was emblematic of an extinguished life. Support for this new theory is sought in the custom of immuring candles in the foundation of churches and houses, of which, Mr Howlett says, many examples are known[737]. Owing to the amount of correlative evidence bearing on the question of fire-kindlers and fire-worship, I prefer to regard the candle as representing the attenuated symbolism of light and heat.

Even while referring to candles, we have been forced to observe another burial-gift—the coin placed in the hand or mouth. Since the coin had originally a supposed useful purpose, a few words may be devoted to it. The practice is at least as old as the time of the ancient Greeks, who were accustomed to place an obolus in the dead person’s mouth. To a classic origin, however, in the ordinary sense of the term, the custom cannot be limited. It prevailed in pagan Germany[738], and in Christian England. Professor Tylor cites examples from several countries, and gives a list of authorities. De Groot states that the silver coin deposited in the mouth of the corpse by the Chinese has replaced the earlier cowrie, just as it has superseded the cowrie for purposes of currency[739]. The custom of coin-burial was well known to the Romano-Britons, as is proved by the excavations of General Pitt-Rivers in Cranborne Chase. We are compelled, therefore, to postulate a more extended history than Greece or Rome would afford. Even in England the belief must have been profound, even touching, in its sincerity. Silver coins are occasionally dug up in English churchyards, and the tradition runs that such money had originally been placed in the mouth of the corpse[740]. Evidence of this kind prevents a too confident acceptance of Mr Romilly Allen’s conclusion that the idea of Charon’s penny ceased with the introduction of Christianity[741]. The spirit, if not the precise tradition, of the ancient custom long survived with some intensity. Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff relates how an old Burgundian woman, being asked why she had placed a sou in the hand of a dead child, replied, C’est pour payer le trajet à Charon. The narrator supposes, with fair reason, that this incident revealed the lasting influence of Roman civilization over the Gaulish people[742]. The woman may have heard, or read, the classic tradition, but this is rather improbable. Folk-memory had seemingly retained the orthodox explanation, but the custom itself may go back to the time when the newly invented coin replaced some cruder amulet. From what centre, or centres, the belief in the virtue of the coin was transmitted, is at present unknown.

An illustration drawn from the writings of Mr Thomas Hardy will doubtless be pardoned, since much genuine Wessex folklore has been presented to us in the garb of fiction by that shrewd observer and archaeologist. In The Mayor of Casterbridge [i.e. Dorchester], after having been told of the death of Mrs Henchard, the reader is treated to a rustic gossip on death in general. Mrs Cuxsom gives her own little commentary, and then proceeds to quote the words of her dead neighbour: “And there’s four ounce pennies, the heaviest I could find, a-tied up in bits of linen, for weights—two for my right eye, and two for my left. And when you’ve used ’em, and my eyes don’t open no more, bury the pennies, good souls, and don’t ye go spending ’em, for I shouldn’t like it.” In the sequel, a servant buries the coins in the garden, but Christopher Coney digs them up and spends them. One of the listeners, Solomon Longways, excuses this action, and can see “no treason in it,” but the general verdict ran: “’Twas a cannibal deed[743].”

Now we may be certain that this conversation describes, in all essential details, the Wessex superstition. Within our own times, Northumbrian folk were wont to bury a penny piece just under the soil of a newly-made grave. And it is a very common belief that misfortune will follow him who desecrates the coin—the ferryman’s penny—by ignoble use. If, as is probable, the “eye-coin” be the genuine representative of this penny, it has degenerated into a humble accessory of the death-chamber; it is not now even deposited in the grave. Nevertheless, the segregated coin must not be put again to everyday uses. Well did Jowett of Balliol in luminous phrase speak of “underground religion,” that strain of superstition which cannot be banished from the peasant mind. Nor, indeed, does orthodoxy, at least as understood by provincial or unthinking folk, raise any serious demur to the observance.

We cannot accept as adequate the superficial explanation that the penny is simply used to close the eyes. This is the immediate purpose, of course, but it does not explain why a penny, though certainly an object of convenient size and shape, should alone be used. Least of all does it account for the placing of coins in the mouth, or of burying money in the grave. Norwegian folk-lore supplies us with a curious correlative. When the Norwegian peasant takes earth from the churchyard to succour ailing children, he must bury silver coins in place of the stolen specific. Customs like these carry us back, by almost imperceptible transitions, to the building of the British barrow, and to the interment therein of flawless arrow-head or fractured celt. Following the centuries forward, we may dimly surmise why the various changes took place; glancing back, we marvel that the beliefs have been clung to so tenaciously.

Fig. 57. Grave-celt, of polished flint, from Murols, Puy-de-Dôme (Author’s collection). Length 2⅛´´; greatest width 1⅛´´.

We must now leave our first group of objects—the axes, the knives, the arrow-tips, with fire-kindlers, pottery, querns, spindle-whorls, and all similar appliances, in order to give some attention to the next division of the relics. This class, it will be remembered, comprises amulets, talismans, and symbolical objects. Some difficulty arises when we try to separate these from the purely decorative articles, but there are certain relics whose purpose does not seem to admit of doubt. The tiny polished celts, of which an example from Puy de Dôme is shown in [Fig. 57], must have been charms. Specimens much smaller than the one illustrated are often met with. Still more convincing are the small amber axes which Professor Montelius has described as occurring in Scandinavia: these cannot have had any economical use.