Part 6 (1/2)

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE V. Gold Fibulae. _p. 68._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 64.--Sixteenth-century bronze casting from Benin, showing natives holding manillas (after Read and Dalton, _Antiquities of the City of Benin_).]

RING-MONEY

The question of a medium of exchange leads us to mention the very small gold penannular rings, the largest being about an inch in diameter, frequently found in Ireland, which are known as 'ring-money.' There are fifty-six in the National Collection; and a find made near Belfast of a socketed bronze celt in a.s.sociation with some of these objects shows they were in use during the late Bronze Age.[23] Attention has been called to the similarity of these Irish gold rings to the penannular copper rings plated with gold often found in early j.a.panese burials.[24]

[23] Archaeologia, lxi, p. 153.

[24] See Munro, ”Pre-historic j.a.pan,” p. 435, fig. 276.

Many attempts have been made to equate the weights of a series of these rings with some known standard; and in his valuable work ”The Origin of Currency and Weight Standards,” Professor Ridgeway devotes several pages of his Appendix C to a discussion of the subject, and gives a table of the weights arrived at by grouping the rings in multiples of 18.

While there can be no reasonable doubt that these objects were used as a medium of exchange, we are not inclined, in the absence of literary evidence, to go any further into the question of what standard they may represent. Some of these rings are evidently forgeries of ancient times, as they are composed of bronze rings covered with a thin plate of gold. The rings as a rule are plain; but some are ornamented with small strips of darker metal let into the gold, and two examples are twisted like small torcs.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE VI. Gold Ring-Money. _p. 70._]

CHAPTER VII

LEAF-SHAPED SWORDS

A number of leaf-shaped bronze swords have been found in Ireland. They may be roughly divided into two types, those with notches just below the blade and above the handle, and those that are plain. The latter are the earlier, and belong to the late Bronze Age; the former correspond to the Continental swords of the Hallstatt period. The leaf-shaped type was the typical Bronze-Age sword of western and northern Europe. It was developed from the dagger, and, like it, was a thrusting rather than a cutting weapon. The handle is cast in one piece with the blade, and has rivet-holes, and in some cases a slit for the attachment of the hilt, which was no doubt formed of bone or horn plates. The pommel was probably globular, and formed of lead or some heavy material. A bronze sword of this type was found in a house on the Akropolis at Mycenae by Schliemann, and it can be dated at about 1200 B.C.[25] The discovery of this sword may be explained either as the result of a raid, or as showing that invaders from the north had reached Greece as early as this date. A leaf-shaped sword has been noticed on one of the clay tablets dated as late Minoan II, and in one of the stone slabs from over the fifth shaft grave at Mycenae, which represents a figure in a chariot attacking a man on foot, the latter is armed with a leaf-shaped sword.[26] In any case it gives us a date for the period when these swords were in common use in western Europe.

The type with notches below the blade has a tendency to become straighter at the sides, and to lose its leaf-shaped form. The use of the notches is not apparent, but it has been thought that the scabbards at that time were made of wood and were liable to shrink from exposure to weather, and that this may have prevented the sword from being thrust home, so that the edge was cut off by the notches slightly below the handle to avoid cutting the hand. The handle end of this latter type very frequently a.s.sumes a form like a fish's tail.

These swords develop into the iron swords of the Hallstatt period, of which so far only one Irish example has been found. A bronze sword of the notched type formed part of the Dowris h.o.a.rd, and is figured in the ”British Museum Bronze-Age Guide,” plate ii. Two remarkably fine specimens of this type were found in 1912 with a socketed spear-head at Tempo, County Fermanagh.

[25] Naue, ”Die Vorromischen Schwerter,” pp. 12 and 20.

[26] See Burrowes, ”Discoveries in Crete,” p. 183.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 65.--Leaf-shaped bronze swords, found with a spear-head at Tempo, Co. Fermanagh.]

No moulds for casting leaf-shaped swords of either type have been found in Ireland; and it is therefore probable that at the time they were in use sand-casting had replaced casting from stone moulds. The scabbards of the leaf-shaped swords were made of wood or leather, protected by a ferule or chape of bronze, which was fastened to it by rivets; the point of the weapon does not seem to have reached the end of the sheath. There are several examples of bronze chapes in the Royal Irish Academy's collection, and they display a considerable variety of design. Some are long and tubular in shape (fig. 66), while others are of the winged or boat-shaped type which is found on the Continent (fig. 67). Others again are of a small and simple type. The rivet-holes for the attachment of the sheaths can be seen in nearly all the Irish specimens. The casting of these objects shows a good deal of skill, as the metal is very thin. The winged variety are probably the latest, as they have been found with iron swords of Hallstatt type on the Continent.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 66.--Bronze chapes.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 67.--Winged chapes.]

s.h.i.+ELDS

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 68.--Bronze s.h.i.+eld, found at Lough Gur, Co. Limerick.]

Two circular s.h.i.+elds or bucklers of bronze have been found in Ireland.

There is only one in the National Collection, the fine s.h.i.+eld discovered at Lough Gur, County Limerick. There is, however, a small s.h.i.+eld of bronze ornamented with large bosses in the British Museum which was found at Athenry, County Galway.[27] These bronze s.h.i.+elds have never been found in the British Islands with any objects which would give any definite clue to their date; but they are generally referred to the late Bronze Age. They belong to a common type, being decorated with numerous bands of small bosses separated by concentric circles. They appear to have been hammered out.

[27] ”British Museum Bronze-Age Guide,” p. 30.