THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 1 53 



have been derived originally from the Phoenicians, the earliest navi- 

 gators and merchants, who founded Carthage, and sent colonies 

 to Sardinia, Sicily and Spain, a thousand years B. C They traded 

 to the Cornish coast for tin, one of the constituents of bronze. 



Several of the Irish weapons have been analyzed, and are found 

 to contain from one to fourteen percent, of tin, and in some instances 

 a small percentage of lead also. 



Although the Sidonian origin is not generally accepted, I con- 

 fess I cannot see the improbability of it. The early Celtic Danann 

 tribe, in Ireland, have left us several of the moulds for casting spear 

 heads and battle axes. The circumstance does not prove that the 

 manufacture of the metal implements had, as has been stated, grad- 

 ually been developed, and not originally acquired from a foreign 

 source. Pouchet's theory is that the small-helved swords (Scandinavian) 

 were used by the women of North Europe, who usually fought among 

 the men. 



Bronze Celts, Axes. — Ireland is known to antiquarians as " the 

 land of the bronze celt." No country known to us can display such 

 a collection as she possesses. In the Dublin museum cases alone, 

 there are 686 ; and altogether 1,500 more are known to be in pos- 

 session of private collectors, etc., independent of a large collection 

 purchased or obtained by the British Museum. You may find them 

 likewise scattered all over the United States, great numbers having 

 been purchased from dealers by American tourists. Many of the 

 Scandinavian celts are decorated in the same way and fashioned in 

 the Irish manner, but when the suggestion was made that the Ostmen 

 may have acquired them during the centuries of incessant warfare 

 they waged against civilization, the singular fact was mentioned by a 

 Celtic scholar, that although copper (umha) and tin (stan), white and 

 red bronze, (ban and derg umha), are mentioned by the earliest annal- 

 ists, they seem to be ignorant of any implement whatever bearing a 

 resemblance to a bronze celt. He considered this a positive proof 

 of very great antiquity. 



It may be remarked, comparatively little of the monkish records 

 have been preserved. What escaped the Danes fell, in after times, 

 into the hands of men equally ignorant. 



More than a century ago Dr. Hamilton, F. T. C. D., exhibited 

 to the Antiquarian Society a bronze celt in its stone mould ; several 



