756 REPORT— 1902. 



which the beaker was accompanied by ancient objects ; three with large flint 

 daggers, three with buttons with the V-shaped perforation below, and five with 

 stone wrist-guards, all of which objects belong to the later neolithic period on the 

 Continent. None of the objects found with the remaining fourteen interments are 

 of later date than the thin, flat, broad linife-dagger. As no other ceramic type in 

 Britain can show such a pedigree, it is clear that the beaker is the oldest, though 

 before it died out several other types of fictilia came into use. The beakers found 

 with food-vessels and burnt interments are shown by their form and ornament to 

 belong to a rather late period. As ornamentation is a very important subject, 

 fifty -nine examples taken from the three types are exhibited and contrasted. Some 

 later developments are pointed out. Tlie ornament, like the form, points to a 

 different secondary origin for a and /3. 



The localities where beakers have been found in Great Britain and Ireland are 

 shown on a map. Though /3 is the least represented numerically, it has the 

 widest diffusion. It extends from the coast of Sussex to Sutherland — perhaps to 

 the Shetlands — and is the only type at present known in Ireland. 



Ten photographic examples of type 3 from the Rhine, between Coblenz and 

 Mainz, are compared with ten British. The ornament of the Rhenish examples is 

 shown on a slide and compared. Some of the ornament on the Rhenish beakers 

 is borrowed from a different type, known as the ' bell-shaped beaker.' This par- 

 ticular system of ornamentation is not found west of the Rhine A' alley, south of 

 the Danube, east of about the longitude of Vienna, or north of the latitude of 

 Berlin. 



The origin of type a can only be suggested, not demonstrated. Its form seems 

 derived from the much earlier Schnicr-becher and its later off"-shoots, a few 

 examples of which will be exhibited on a slide. But the practice of distributing 

 the ornament in zones or bauds is probably owing to the influence of the ' bell- 

 beaker,' one example of which is shown. This is an extension of Dr. Gotze's 

 theory. Type /3 is derived from a type much more influenced by the * bell-beaker,' 

 though some examples of it are perhaps merely later modifications of the ' bell- 

 beaker.' In type a the influence of the ' bell-beaker ' is much less direct, so that, 

 supposing both a and /3 are off'-shoots of the ' cord-beaker,' they have different 

 secondary origins, but go back to a common form at a point in time many centuries 

 earlier. But the possibility is not excluded that the origin of /3 is to be referred 

 entirely to the ' bell-beaker,' in which case a and 3 have an independent origin. 



The areas in Central Europe where the ' cord-beaker ' and its off-shoots, as well 

 as the ' bell-beaker,' are found, are Northern Bohemia and the region of the Saale, 

 a western tributary of the Elbe. As a fully developed type/3 occurs on the Rhine, 

 both at the centre of its course and near its mouth. From the Rhine it passed 

 over to Britain. 



2. On Objects of the Plateau Kind from the Interglacial Gravels of Ireland. 



By W. J. Knowles. 



A few years ago I obtained from Mr. Benjamin Harrison a selection of plateau 

 implements from the South of England. I found that the forms and style of 

 workmanship were not new to me, as I had met with somewhat similar objects in 

 Ireland. These mostly belonged to the class which I had often described as the 

 older series of Irish flint implements. The Irish objects, like the English plateau 

 implements, showed in most cases a dark-brown patina and ' the fashion of 

 chipping the flint perpendicularly through the thickness.' Lately I have obtained 

 from gravels of interglacial age in Galgorm Parks, Co. Antrim, flints showing 

 the same warm brown patina and the ' perpendicular chipping through the 

 thickness.' Among the Irish specimens is one fairly large object, 5^ inches 

 long, which is not unlike a palaeolithic implement in outline, but the only 

 dressing it shows is of the perpendicular kind round the sides. It fits the hand, 

 and would be a useful implement for striking, if stunning^, not cutting, were the 

 object in view. It resembles some of the English plateau examples in shape, 

 but is much larger. The Irish sjiecimens are as yet few, as I do not know of any- 



