DISCOVERY OF A GOLD CUP IN CORNWALL. 41 



men recently shown in the Exhibition at Paris, amongst the 

 Danish Antiquities, has, as described to me by Mr. Franks, the 

 form of an ordinary basin, of very thin plate, ornamented with 

 horizontal bands and concentric circles ; it has a slight curved 

 handle, like the elongated neck of some animal, terminating in a 

 small head with ears, intended possibly to represent that of a 

 wyvern. M. de Mortillet, however, describes it as the head of a 

 horse rudely designed.'" Eleven of these golden vessels, similar 

 in their fashion, were found together in the Island of Funen. 

 They are assigned by Scandinavian archseologists to the later 

 times of the Age of Bronze. 



There is great difficulty in suggesting a date, even approxi- 

 mately, for the remarkable relic brought before us by Mr. Smirke. 

 Its discovery with a sepulchral deposit and urn in a cist of stones, 

 more especially as being accompanied by a weapon of bronze, 

 may doubtless lead us to assign the relics to a remote period, 

 when the use of that metal prevailed. It is observable that 

 in another remarkable discovery of golden relics in Cornwall, 

 namely the two lunulm found at Padstow, as stated in the 

 Archceological Journol by Mr. Smirke, the precious deposit was 

 likewise accompanied by an object of bronze, a celt of the most 

 simple form, the flat axe-blade, which may possibly have been the 

 earliest type of the series of relics of that class, t 



It is to be regretted that no record of the fashion either of 

 the blade, described as a " spear-head," or of the cinerary vase 

 and its incised ornamentation, should have been preserved. >^ The 

 sepulchral mound, however, enclosing an urn-burial in a cist, may 

 unquestionably be referred to an early age of British antiquity, 

 subsequent to the so-called Stone-Period. It is worthy of remark 

 that the one-handled cup of amber, noticed by Mr. Smirke, found 



* Gr. de Mortillet, Promenades pre-liistoriques a V Exposition Universelle, 

 p. 121 ; given also in his Materiaux pour Vliistoire primitive de Vhomme, torn, 

 iii. The head, as supposed, of a horse, occurs likewise on the termination 

 of the handle in objects of bronze found in Denmark, and described as 

 razors. This feature, M. de Mortillet observes, may indicate a date subse- 

 quent to the Age of Bronze, properly so called. Representations of animals 

 first occur, as it is stated, on objects of the early part of the Age of Iron. 

 Promenades, ut supra, p. 120. 



I Arch. Journ., vol. xxii, p. 277. See of this type of celt, Catal. Antiqu. 

 R. I. Acad., by Sir W. R. Wilde, p. 362. 



