826 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1895. 



the outside covering is effected.^ Upon the side of the boat illustrated 

 in fig. 38 will be observed two figures of concentric rings, a design so 

 frequently met with in the i^rehistoric relics of Scandinavia. 



A wooden dish,^ found with other objects in a funeral ship, bears dec- 

 orations consisting of concentric rings similar to the preceding. 



Petroglyphs in abundance representing so-called cup stones, nucle- 

 ated circles, and concentric circles of various numbers of rings, as high 

 as five and six, and occasionally even more, occur throughout northern 

 Europe, from Ireland, Scotland, and elsewhere in the British Isles, 

 eastward throughout Scandinavia, Fiidand, and Russia, into Siberia. 



In a petroglyph at Lokeberg, in Bohuslan, Sweden,^ are represented 

 a number of manned Viking ships, above three of which are portrayed 

 nucleated rings, several of which are attached to projections connected 

 with the vessel, and lesembling uplifted banners or other emblems. In 

 a number of instances are small spots only, without the surrounding 

 circle. These circles in contact with vessels resemble very much the 

 Eskimo engraved figures on the rod shown in 

 another place on plate 08, fig. 6. 



Professor Oscar Montelius figures in his "Kul- 

 tur Schwedens in Yorchristlicher Zeit" a gold 

 vase nearly 3 inches in height and about 4 

 inches in diameter, about the body of which are 

 four rows of concentric circles. The upper row, 

 near the neck, consists of such raised figures 

 each more than one-sixteenth of an inch in di- 

 ameter, while the row a short distance below 

 this consists of rings averaging three- sixteenths 

 of an inch acTOSS. Below the greatest diameter 

 of the vessel is another row of raised concentric 

 rings, the outer one measuring about five-eighths of an inch across, 

 while the circles near the base, and extending in a row about it, are 

 apparently a little less in diameter. 



These rows of circles are separated by longitudinal raised lines, 

 between some of which, both above and below the row of the largest cir- 

 cles, are short vertical lines presenting what appears like a milled edge. 

 This style of ornament is very general and, as noted elsewhere, of 

 widespread occurrence. 



Mr. Frederick George Jackson, in his description of the jewelry of 

 the Samoyads,* says that the bonnet is adorned with tails of colored 



Fig. 39. 



SAMOYAD ORNAMENT OF METAL. 



' Quoted from Report of National Museum for 1891, 1892, pp. 557, 558, fig. 41. 

 (Prehistoric Naval Architecture, Geo. H. lioehmer.) 



The reader is referred to an interesting paper ou Origins of Prehistoric Ornament 

 in Ireland, completed in Part I of Vol. VII, of the Journal of the Royal Society of 

 Antiquaries of Ireland, for 1897, by Mr. George Coffey. 



2 Report of the United States National Museum for 1891. 1892, p. 594, fig. 108. 



3 Oscar Montelius, Die Kultur Schwedens in Yorchristlicher Zeit, Berlin, 1885, p. 73. 

 fig. 87. 



■*The Great Frozen Land. London, 1895, p. 67. 



