1906] The cruciform brooclies of Norway. 95 



is very little marked and its middle parts is not broader than its 

 ends. Certainly this form of the bow is so unique in Western 

 Norway that we must conclude that it has come from another part 

 of Scandinavia. Another point of interest is the ribbon along the 

 middle of the bow which at once recalls a corresponding detail often 

 observed in the prototype of the cruciform brooches (fig. 21); per- 

 håps it must be considered as an archaism, very surprising in this 

 late stage of the development, I am not able to give a satisfactory 

 explanation of the occurence of this remarkable form of the bow in 

 a late brooch made in Western Norway; but as a whole the form 

 reminds us of a few of the Danish brooches, 1 ) and I consider it 

 likely that the model of it has been a brooch from Denmark. 



The foot consists of two plates separated by a broad moulded 

 ribbon. The upper of the plates is by its form related to the rare 

 variety secn in fig. 84 which I have suggested may also have been 

 derived from a Danish form. — The broad moulded ribbon in the 

 form seen here is certainly different from the moulded neck of the 

 animal-head, common in the late cruciform brooches of Western 

 Norway, but very like the same part in many of the brooches of 

 the type fig. 112 (compare fig. 161 and also fig. 65) and, conse- 

 quently, I am inclined to regard it as borrowed from that form, 

 the more so as the whole form of the foot is not very unlike in 

 these two instances. — Finally, the terminating plate, of semicircular 

 form, is the plate whose origin I have tried to decluce from the 

 Prussian brooches with star-pattern foot. 



It is not a new discovery that late forms show a combination 

 of elements which have sprung from very different sources, and of 

 course we must not imagine to ourselves that the workman, when 

 making the brooch in question, picked out the different elements 

 of it from a collection of different brooches actually placed before 

 him. The different forms of ornaments used at the same time might 

 in some instances naturally induce the workman to try a new com- 

 bination of forms. But the general taste of prehistoric times does 

 not seem to have been much inclined to such experiments as most 

 of these combinations only got a short life. It is a most remark- 

 able fact that the types remained so free from foreign elements as 

 really was the case. 



] ) As for example Copenhagen Museum no. C. 3930, 2817, 2771, all found 

 in Jutland, and all of them being in a late stage of development. 



