1884-1885.] 3^7 



is brought up to a characteristic ridge, as in the old Celtic 

 bronze work with which we are familiar. The introduction 

 of iron, however it was brought about in Ireland, led to the 

 disuse of bronze for certain purposes, especially for sword and 

 lance heads, and its greater powers of resistance, we may 

 assume, would before long have led to its use in defensive 

 armour. The early workers in iron, however, may have been 

 quite unable to forge the delicate fillets, and hence all the diffi- 

 cult parts were fashioned in the metal they had been for ages 

 skilled in manipulating. If this theory were correct, we should 

 be able to fix the age of our helmet as early in the iron age? 

 and it would consequently be the very earliest iron helmet 

 known from this country. Actually, of course, there is no 

 such thing as an historical stone, bronze, and iron age, for the 

 use of iron dates back far beyond the oldest records, while it is 

 still the stone age with some races of men. In estimating the 

 antiquity of an object, the country in which it is found has to 

 be taken into account. In Iceland, for example, all the native 

 art products look as old as William the Conqueror, ornamenta- 

 tion contemporary in appearance with the Bayeux tapestry is 

 dated of the 17th and i8th centuries. We should be quite pre- 

 pared to find primitive weapons clung to in Ireland long after 

 they had been discarded in England, and it is probable that, 

 while their chiefs and noted warriors fought with iron and 

 bronze, the tribesmen used stone lance and arrow heads. 

 Beautifully wrought arrow heads are immensely abundant, 

 quite on the surface of the ground in many spots, while in Eng- 

 land flints are nothing like so skilfully worked, and are always, 

 unless unearthed by accident, buried at some depth. It is 

 hardly probable that at any date prior to the Norman invasion 

 helmets formed part of a warrior's costume in Ireland. Mak- 

 ing every allowance for the perishable nature of an object made 

 of sheet iron, the bronze ornaments would resist alike the axes 

 and other implements which are found so commonly, yet I 

 have never seen anything like the eyelet rims or the nose piece 

 ornaments in collections, and it seems likely that only a chief- 

 tain could have possessed it. We know, at all events, that many 



