436 EARLY MAN IN BRITAIN. [CHAP. xn. 



The Etruskan Influence. 



The designs of the metal work of the Prehistoric Iron 

 age in Britain are not to be looked upon as being the 

 spontaneous development of those of the Bronze age, but 

 to have been derived from abroad. The flowing lines, 

 the flamboyants, and the various combinations of the 

 spiral, unknown in Britain before, were introduced from 

 France and Germany, through which countries they may 

 be traced as far as Greece and Italy. In Mr. Franks' 

 opinion they have been derived from the south, 1 and are 

 to be looked upon as marking the influence of the Etrus- 

 kans and Greeks upon the regions north of the Alps. 

 Two distinct influences were at work in Britain in the 

 Prehistoric Iron age, of which the one is far older than 

 the other. Certain articles, such as the gold cap found 

 in the bog at Devil's Bit, County Tipperary (Fig. 157), 

 are ornamented with designs which may be traced 

 through France and Germany to Hallstadt, and ulti- 

 mately into ancient Etruria. The same may be said of 

 the gold armour discovered at Mold (Figs. 159, 160). 

 These two may be taken as the types of a large class 

 of articles, which testify to the far-extending influence 

 of the Etruskans, which we shall define in the next 

 chapter. In all probability the overland trade with 

 Etruria was the first which brought the art of the 

 Mediterranean to the shores of Britain and Ireland (see 

 Map, Fig. 168). 



The Influence of Ancient Greece. 



Ancient Greece also exercised an influence on Pre- 

 historic Britain, but only after the decline of the Etruskan 



1 Congr. Int. Archtfol. Prehist., Brussels vol., 1872, p. 516. 



