Wright — Irish Antiquities deposited with the Acadetmj. 287 



been broken before being placed in the box ; when perfect the box would 

 not have contained it. 



A great deal of interest has been excited by the discoveiy of this, 

 as far as I know, unique specimen, and there has been some controversy 

 as to the date of the burial, one writer fixing it "at or about the intro- 

 duction of Christianity into Ireland." Dr. Thurnham, from the mecha- 

 nical details of the little yew box, seems more correctly to assign it to 

 the Mediaeval period, and to regard the remains as those of a member 

 of the ecclesiastical buildings which still exist. One would like to know 

 the mystery of this broken pin, so treasured up in life and then buried 

 in the grave, but this is hopeless. Bronze pin and needle cases have 

 been found in Eastern excavations, such as those in bronze found at 

 Salamis, but such throw no light on the box now exhibited. This 

 object was given to the Kilkenny Museum by the Eight Hon. John 

 Wynne. ^ 



(9). Portion of a Pastoral Staff.— Iv, March, 1854, Mr. James F. 

 Blake, of Ballynemona, presented to the Kilkenny Museum the head 

 of an ancient Irish pastoral staff, which had been in his family for a 

 considerable period ; he could not say how it came into his family, or to 

 what part of Ireland it originally belonged ; his longest recollection of 

 it was its being used as a plaything by the children of the house. He 

 remembered that when he first knew it it was about two feet long in 

 the staff, and it had two more bosses of intertwined lacertine work 

 below those still remaining. The staff itself was covered with thin 

 plates of silver, the pilfering of which was possibly the cause of the 

 reduction in the size of the staff. The wood appeared to be yew, over 

 which, at this moment, some small remnants of silver coating were to be 

 found. The peculiarly shaped head was of bronze and nearly devoid 

 of ornament. The recurved dragon heads had their eyes filled in, two 

 with red enamel and two with silver ; the red eyes were on one side 

 of the heads the silver ones on the other. 



This staff has been examined by Petrie, Todd, Graves, Albert "Way, 

 and "Westwood, and has been described and figured by James Graves : 

 in the judgment of all, so far as Ireland is concerned, it is unique. 

 I am glad that it now should form one of the fine series of Pastoral 

 Staffs which enriches our Museum, and I venture to express the hope 

 that we may some day have an illustrated catalogue of this portion of 

 our Ecclesiastical Antiquities. Wilde had begun the collection of 

 the materials for such ; a great deal has been added since then ; and 



1 Journal, Eoyal Society of Antiquaries, Ireland, vol. vii., c. s., p. 201. 



