GOLD ORNAMENTS. 45 



Soldering seems to have been entirely unknown during the 

 Bronze Age, and even during the earlier times of the Iron 

 Age. Thus the Hallstadt bronze vessels, when broken, were 



o 



always riveted together. 



I have also figured a group (figs. 64 67) of Irish gold 

 ornaments. The earlier ones probably belong to the Bronze 

 Age ; a torque much like fig. 64 formed part of the great 

 Larnaud find, but they appear to have come down to a 

 much later period. The fact is interesting that very similar 

 ornaments, made however not of gold, but of iron, are now 

 worn by the natives of Africa. One of these is represented 

 in fig. 67.* 



The ornamentation on the objects of bronze is of a pecu- 

 liar, and at the same time uniform, character ; it consists of 

 simple geometrical patterns, and is formed by combinations 

 of spirals, circles and zigzag lines ; representations of animals 

 and plants being very rarely attempted. Even the few ex- 

 ceptions to this rule are perhaps more apparent than real. 

 Thus, two such only are figured in the Catalogue of the 

 Copenhagen Museum ; one is a rude figure of a swan (fig. 

 37), the other of a man (fig. 39). The second of these 

 forms the handle of a knife, which appears to be straight 

 in the blade, a type characteristic of the Iron Age, but 

 rarely found in that of Bronze. As regards one of them, 

 therefore, there is an independent reason for referring it 

 to the period of transition, or at least to the close of the 

 Bronze Age. There is, indeed, one type of pattern, usually 

 found on the razor-knives, but sometimes also on others, 

 intended probably for a rude representation of a ship (figs. 

 42 45). Even, however, if we admit this to be the case, 

 and if we accept these objects as belonging to the Bronze 

 Age, this will only show how little advance had yet been 

 made in the art of representing natural objects. 



* Archseologia, vol. xliii. p. 442. 



