EARLY MAN 



re-casting or for secret burial in the earth. The weapon having been 

 worn out by use, or damaged beyond repair, became of no use except for 

 melting up and re-casting. The presence of socketed and looped celts and 

 socketed spear-heads, as well as the ferrule, indicates a fairly late stage in 

 the Bronze Age. The ornamental character of the palstave and celts 

 points to the same conclusion. Some of the objects found in this hoard 

 are now in the museum at Nottingham Castle, others are in the Notting- 

 ham Natural History Museum, and others are in private possession. 



Another interesting hoard of Bronze Age antiquities was found some 

 years ago at Newark and passed into the fine collection of Canon Green- 

 well. They comprise: (i) two bronze discs 5J inches in diameter, 

 pierced with a hole in the centre, with a raised rib round their margins, 

 and with a cone-like rising or projection in the middle ; (2) socketed 

 celts ; and (3) a broad socketed spear-head. 



Several objects were found in Nottingham during the excavations for 

 the Theatre Royal, including, I am told, a bronze celt, a bronze spear- 

 head, and a sword-blade of iron. 1 Three spear-heads are said to have been 

 dug up in Nottingham when the workmen were excavating for the 

 Grantham Canal. 3 



Sir John Evans possesses a fine winged celt found in the gravel of 

 the Trent at Colwick, near Nottingham. Immediately below the stop, 

 the blade is fluted, and the bottom of the fluting tapers somewhat in the 

 contrary direction to the tapering of the blade. 3 It is a singularly hand- 

 some and effective implement. 



Another fine bronze object found in this county was the socketed 

 and fluted spear-head discovered in 1803 in the course of some drainage 

 works at Gringley. A drawing of the spear-head, exhibited at a meeting 

 of the Society of Antiquarians of London on 9 January, 1806, has been 

 engraved and published in Arcbceologia, vol. xvi, Plate LIV, fig. I. 



The small bronze pin found at Gotham in association possibly with 

 an interment, and accompanied by a neatly chipped spear-head of flint, 

 furnishes an interesting illustration of that overlapping of stone and metal 

 tools or weapons of which prehistoric archaeology affords many instances. 



Some bronze objects seem to have been found with traces of crema- 

 tion. For example, there were found at Combes near Southwell towards 

 the end of the eighteenth century two socketed celts which when 

 discovered appeared to be buried in a bed of ashes. 4 In 1836 workmen 

 excavating along the Fosse Road, near Newark, found urns placed about 

 2 ft. to 2 ft. 6 in. from the surface, and with them a pair of scissors 

 much oxidized, and pottery probably of British manufacture. 6 When 

 Major Rooke opened the barrow near Oxton an urn of iron half full of 

 ashes, a sword in its scabbard, and fifteen glass beads were found. 6 



Our history ends as it began with the Church Hole Cave of Cres- 

 well. The civilization of the Bronze Age came with the Celts and 



1 Information supplied by Mr. W. Rigby. ' Orange, Hut. ofNott. i, 64. 



' Evans, Bronze Imp. 77. * Dickinson, Southwell, 298. 



5 Cornelius Brown, Annals of Newark, 4. ' Throsby, TAoroton (1797), vol. ii, 176. 



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