184 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



typical example of the cupped pin is one of bronze, of unknown provenance, in 

 the Boyal Irish Academy's Collection, and figured in Wildr : /ue, 



p. 558, fig. 4: D E~~ans, in his Bronze Implements, p. 372, reproducing this 

 cut, quotes other examples from the famous Heathery Burn cave, and from 

 a peat-bog near the Point of Sleat in Skye. The last-named is the most 

 important, for its associations are recorded. It was found with a fifth-period 

 bronze sword and two socketed spear-heads (Proc. Soe. A - \. voL iii, 



p. 1 . Another Irish example, apparently from a erannog in a lake called 

 3 1 : alty, near Carriekmacross, is figured in the Archaeological Journal, voL iii, 

 p. 49. 1 All these pins are of bronze. The Skye specimen seems to be the 

 only recorded example which Tesembles the pin before us in having a conical 

 spike rising up in the centre of the cup. 



The spiral ornament calls for a few words. It is extremely unusual to 

 find a pattern consisting of plain open spirals in metal- work, though it is 

 common enough in Xew Grange and allied stone monuments. The spirals 

 have been made with a punch, and most likely this instrument was one of the 

 tools of a goldsmith, and was intended to save the trouble of the freehand 

 drawing of spirals which would form pari of some more extended and 

 complex pattern or diaper. The use of a punch to make groups of concentric 



les ik rtlief on gold ornaments is common enough : there are several 

 examples in the E.I.A. collection ; another was the well-known Cornerford 

 bowL commonly but ridiculously called an old Irish crown. But the punched 

 incised spirals of the objects now under discussion, so far as I know, are 

 unique, in Ireland at least The use of a punch is probably another indication 

 of a late date. The roughly scratched spirals on the shield are obviously 

 additions made by an amateur hand in imitation of the ornaments impressed 

 on the pin and the axe-heads by the professional goldsmith. 



Taking all the evidence together, we cannot be far wrong if we assign the 

 hoard to about the end of the fourth or the beginning of the fifth of the five 

 periods into which Montelius divides the British Bronze Age. Having thus 

 arrived at a conclusion as to the dating of the find, the next question that 

 arises is its purpose. Here there is wider room for conjecture. 



^Vr may, I r'nink, take it for granted that we have to deal with a grave 

 deposit. The difficulties raised by Canon Greenwell in the letters quoted 

 above are real but i. as it seems to me, insupera'ole : though I should 

 certainly agree with Canon Greenwell in doubting that the deposit had been 

 placed inside an urn. The torque, bracelet, and pin are then simply orna- 

 ments deposited with the dead, according to a universal custom that needs no 



■ IVo apparently early erannog groups are described together in this psj -er and its 

 author has not been careful to keep them apart. 



