SOCIETY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN. 115 



ON THREE BRONZE DAGGER-BLADES FOUND IN 

 ABERDEENSHIRE. 



By Professor R. W. REID, M.D., F.R.C.S. 



Through the exertions of Mr. James Smith, Servitor in the An- 

 thropological Museum of the University, there have been recently 

 added to the pre-historic collection in that Museum three bronze 

 dagger-blades. 



Specimens such as these are so rarely found in Scotland, and 

 therefore so very interesting and valuable, that I think that they are 

 worthy of being shown to the Society. 



They, were exposed on the farm of New Park, New Machar, 

 Aberdeenshire, by Mr. David Davidson, tenant of that farm, in 

 January of this year, while making a bridge over a ditch leading from 

 the New Park Moss and between two of his arable fields. 



The three blades were found lying together between the sub-soil 

 and a layer of moss land about two feet thick, and from over which 

 Mr. Davidson says a " bank of moss about ten feet in depth had been 

 removed some years ago ". 



I visited the situation in which they were found and satisfied 

 myself that Mr. Davidson's statement was an accurate one and also 

 that there was no indication of any kind of interment in association 

 with their deposit- 



Of the three blades : the first (Fig. 1) is in a good state of 

 preservation, the second (Fig. 2) is very fairly so, while the larger half 

 of the third (Fig. 3) has disappeared. 



All blades show signs of decomposition, especially the third, and 

 in neither is there any indication of ornamentation. 



The most perfect specimen (Fig. 1) is flat, has its edges sharp and 



