138 EVIDENCE OF MAX IN GUERNSEY. 



inches high by 9 inches in diameter, and the third 3i inches 

 high by 6 inches in diameter. They were all of light drab 

 coloured pottery, made on a wheel and ornamented with 

 horizontal lines or bands (Plate VII). All were found empty, but 

 a few pieces of iron had been placed across the mouth of one of 

 them to keep out the soil. It would seem, as both at La Hougue 

 au Comte and at Les Issues the vases were found outside the 

 graves, that it was sometimes the custom to place them in this 

 position at this period. 



If w r e examine these objects from our Iron Age Graves we 

 at once see that they all belong to the same period. The long 

 swords are identical in form whether found at Les Issues, Le 

 Catioroc or La Hougue au Comte, so are the shield bosses, spear- 

 heads and knives, and all the vases are varieties of the same type. 

 If we then compare them \vith similar objects illustrated by 

 Dechelette in his Manuel Prehistorique, Vol. II., part III., we 

 find the long swords are typical of those of La Tene III. in 

 France ; so are the forms of the fibulae, daggers, knives, vases 

 and glass beads, whilst on the other hand the shield bosses are 

 of the La Tene II. type. Hence one is led to conclude that, either 

 our graves are early La Tene III., before the circular shield boss 

 peculiar to this period appeared, or we may have been too far 

 out of the way for it to reach us before the conquest of Gaul by 

 Caesar. Yet were we so far out of the way at this period ? The 

 glass beads found in the cist at La Hougue au Comte, all the iron 

 weapons, iron and bronze ornaments and even all the vases were 

 imports. Glass beads, according to Dechelette, came to the Gauls 

 from upper Italy, so did also the prototypes of the vases. Ours 

 seem far two well made to have been local work. The one from 

 the Catioroc and those from La Hougue au Comte are nearly 

 identical with the "vases a cordes" of La Tene III. in France 

 and with those found at Aylesford, Kent, of the same period, 

 which both Dechelette in his Manuel (Vol. II., part III., p. 1487) 

 and Sir Charles Read in the Guide to the Iron Age Department 

 in the British Museum (p. 25) say are local copies in pottery oj 

 bronze corded vases imported from Italy. The Venetii, the great 

 maritime people of Brittany, whose fleet was so nearly a match 

 for that of Caesar, and who according to him traded with Britain, 

 were probably the means of intercourse between our island and 

 the mainland. 



We have therefore conclusive proof, from the objects found 

 in them, that our stone graves date from about the first century 

 B.C., La Tene III. The idea that formerly existed, that they 

 were graves of Saxon or Scan din avian pirates, cannot be supported, 

 for the forms of the arms, ornaments and pottery of the Age of 

 the Barbarians, as Dechelette styles it, were very different. 



In the Lukis Museum we have also seven Gaulish coins 

 found in Guernsey of the type of the coinage of the Coriosolites, 



