Maca lister — On a Hoard of Remarkable Gold Objects. 185 



comment ; though so rich a grave deposit is excessively rare, if not unpre- 

 cedented, in Ireland. The curious linking of the torque and bracelet together 

 is perhaps evidence that the former was not originally made for the person 

 in whose tomb it was found, but for a smaller individual who, perhaps, paid 

 the normal penalty for his inferior physique. But the axes and the shield 

 open up other questions. 



The first point that strikes the eye is the contrast between the excellent 

 workmanship of the axes and the extremely rough make of the shield. It 

 would appear that the axes were the work of a practised goldsmith, but the 

 shield was home-made : everything shows the tentative hand of the amateur ; 

 even the gold is inferior. The warrior had been provided with an armoury of 

 imitation weapons of offence from the atelier of some goldsmith, and tried to 

 make for himself a weapon of defence that would complete his equipment. 



The next point is that the shield, rough though it be, is of very great 

 value in illustrating the construction of early Bronze-age shields. The 

 -circular shape: the four holes for the strap-handle; the ornament of 

 concentric circles and zigzags ; and, above all, the notch in the edge for 

 -observation or for the passage of a spear-shaft, are all real contributions to 

 knowledge. The Bronze-age shields which we possess are all assigned to 

 the fifth Bronze-age period. They are circular, and have a metal handle 

 riveted inside ; the four holes, which obviously indicate a strap, distinctly 

 suggest an earlier phase in the development of the shield, for which we 

 have no extant illustrations. Then, the ornament of the extant shields 

 consists for the greater part of concentric rings, with rows of punched 

 bosses between them. The ornamentation of the shield before us, how- 

 ever , carries us back to the ornament of the earlier periods of the Bronze 

 Age— the period of the lunulae, which likewise are decorated with patterns 

 founded on the zigzag motive. To this ornament of an earlier type the 

 roughly scratched spirals have been superadded ; and the arrangement of 

 these spirals in a swastika is surely a fact not without significance. Lastly, 

 there is no existing parallel among the shields in our museums for the 

 notch in the edge of the shield. It survives, as a rudimentary organ 

 survives, in the curious form of irregularities in the ornamentation of the 

 surface of certain shields. The leather shield from Clonbrin, described 

 by Mr. Armstrong in the Academy's Proceedings (XXVII C, p. 259), and 

 some other examples which he has illustrated in the same paper, may be 

 referred to in this connexion. In short, just as the flat axes represent a 

 survival of an earlier form of weapon, so does the shield ; it probably 

 illustrates for us the shield proper to the second period of the Bronze Age, 

 ■of which no actual specimen has as yet come to light. 



