13 



In a note at A. D. 1385 of the " Four Masters" (vol. iv., p. 701), 

 Dr. 0' Donovan states that the Hill of Croghan in the north of the 

 King's County is celebrated by Spenser in his " Faerie Queene." Smith 

 in his " History of Cork" says of the Dripsey, a tributary of the Lee, 

 that it is "a rivulet that will for ever murmur in the lays of the immor- 

 tal Spenser, when, perhaps, its fountains are no more" (vol. ii., p. 255). 

 In O'Brien's Irish Dictionary, under the word Cloedeach, is the fol- 

 lowing statement: — " Cloedeach, the name of a river in the county of 

 Cork, near Mallow, celebrated in Spenser's Fairy Queen." I have not 

 been able to find any mention of these — Croghan Hill, the River Drip- 

 sey, or the Cloedeach (or Clydagh) in " The Faerie Queene," or in any 

 other part of Spenser's poems. 



II. — On the Scandinavian Antiquities lately discovered at 



IsLANDLKIDGE, NEAR DUBLIN. By Sir W. K. WlLDE. 



[Read December 10, 1866.] 



Sib William Wilde, Yice-President, brought under the notice of 

 the Academy an account of the antiquities of Scandinavian origin, 

 lately found in the fields sloping down from the ridge of Inchicore 

 to the LifTey, and to the south-west of the village of Islandbridge, 

 outside the municipal boundary of the city of Dublin, where, there was 

 reason to believe, some of the so-called Danish engagements with the 

 native Irish took place. These antiquities consisted of swords of great 

 length, spearheads, and bosses of shields, all of iron ; also iron knives, 

 smiths' and metal smelters' tongs, hammer heads, and pin brooches, &c. 

 Of bronze there were four very beautiful tortoise-shaped or mammil- 

 lary brooches found, likewise some decorative mantle pins and helmet 

 crests of findruin, or white metal; beams and scales of the same ma- 

 terial, and leaden weights, decorated and enamelled on top, and in some 

 cases ornamented with minerals. Besides those which were considered 

 to be of Scandinavian origin, there were others, especially small discs 

 of embossed work and enamel, found among them, probably of Frankish 

 or Saxon workmanship, similar to some of those in the Academy's 

 Museum, and figured in the Catalogue, p. 574. Among the most 

 interesting articles in the collection was a sword handle of bronze 

 and iron, highly decorated in Scandinavian pattern, and inlaid with 

 discs of white metal, which Mr. Clibborn was fortunate enough to 

 procure, some months ago, from Islandbridge. "With few exceptions, 

 weapons of that class were believed to be of what was usually, but erro- 

 neously called, Danish origin. Sir William stated that iron swords 

 of that pattern were rarely found in Jutland, or the countries known 

 in modern geography as Denmark, but similar swords were found, 

 chiefly in Norway, and the adjoining coasts of Sweden, and he believed 

 that there were more iron swords of the so-called Danish pattern in the 



