156 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



was marked with, twenty-seven smooth eccentric elevated circles, and 

 between each was a depressed space of the same breadth with the 

 elevated parts marked by a single row of smooth studs. The whole 

 shield was flat and very limber. 



The ancient Irish had several names for shields, of which Sciath 

 may be considered the generic one. This term seems, however, to 

 have been generally applied to the large convex shields made of 

 wicker-work, covered with leather, having somewhat the form of the 

 scuttle-like basket now known by the same name. That it was not 

 confined, however, to convex shields, is shown by its use to designate 

 light bucklers or targets, some of which had bosses upon them. The 

 term Targu, or, as it is also written, Sdarga, which corresponds to the 

 English Target, was used to designate light shields carried by horse- 

 men, may have been applied to bronze shields like the present. But 

 whatever may have been the name given to such shields, there can be 

 no doubt that bronze shields were used by the ancient Irish ; and I am, 

 therefore, disposed to refer this shield to the pre-Christian period of our 

 history. I do not, however, believe it be Scotic, for the Scoti did not 

 use bronze implements or weapons, whereas their predecessors did. 

 For the want of a better word, I shall designate it a " Celtic" shield, 

 understanding by the term " Celts" those predecessors of the Scoti who 

 occupied the country before the arrival of the latter, and to whom the 

 bronze weapons, and other vestiges of a higher civilization (traced by 

 some to a Phoenician origin) are referred. 



If one could imagine — I, however, cannot — that this shield belongs 

 to a later period than I claim for it, and if we consult the Irish annals 

 as to the times when possibly shields were borne by soldiers in the 

 district where this one was found, it may have been left there by 

 Brian Borumha when he made or strengthened a Dun in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Lough Gur, or it may have been worn by the Commander 

 in the army of Domhnal M'Loughlin, King of Ireland, and elder branch 

 of the Northern Hy-Nial or Kinnel Owen, when he invaded the "West 

 and South, on which occasion, after taking hostages from the King of 

 Connaught (Rory O'Connor), he burned Limerick and Kincora, and 

 plundered " the plain of Munster" as far as Emly, Bruree, and Lough 

 Gur. So say the Annals of the Four Masters. 



The latent occasion on which shields — but certainly not such 

 shields as this is — may have been borne in those parts, were in the 

 times of the Earls of Desmond, where there were great hostings, if not 

 great fighting, in that part of the County of Limerick ; for instance in 

 1516, and more recently in the sixteenth century. 



[This shield has since been purchased for the Museum of the Eoyal 

 Irish Academy. A full description of it, with an engraving, is given 

 in the " Journal of the Royal Hist, and Archseol. Soc. of Ireland," 4th 

 Ser., Vol. ii., p. 8. There is one somewhat like it in the British Mu- 

 seum. — Ed.] 



