48 



INTRODUCTION. 



upon the model of the earlier stone axe l . It has neither flanges 

 at the side like fig. 42, nor a socket at the end like fig. 43, 

 and seems to have been hafted by inserting the smaller end into 

 a club-like handle of wood 2 . The simplicity of the form, and 

 the resemblance it bears to the stone axe, both make it probable that 



Fig. 42. A. Fig. 48. . 



it is the earliest type of the bronze axe 3 . Now this form of axe 

 is never found with swords, spear-heads, &c. in the various hoards 

 of bronze articles, which have been so frequently discovered ; the 

 axe in use at the same time with them, and occurring with them 

 in these finds, is the flanged axe (paalstab), and more commonly the 



1 An analogue may be found in the baluster shafts and other ' stone carpentry ' 

 of pre-Conquest churches, no doubt copied from buildings of wood ; and also in some 

 of the iron bridges of our own day, where the stone bridge has served as a model. 



2 The axe found at Butterwick [No. xxxix] shows, upon the oxidised surface, the 

 exact place at which the handle terminated, about one -third of the length from the 

 narrower end. These axes may also have been hafted by fixing them midway into 

 the split end of a shaft, and then binding across with thong. 



3 Axes of this form, made of copper or of a metal containing a very small propor- 

 tion of tin, have been found, not unf requently, in Ireland ; and may be considered to 

 belong to the transition period between the use of stone and bronze. 



