in ancient days. There is evidence from many quarters to show that at the very commencement of history the bronze trade was in the hands of the great maritime nation, the merchant-princes of the Mediterranean, the Phoenicians, who furnished the bronze for the building of Solomon's Temple, and whose artificers made the great bronze lavers. The Bronze Age, therefore, on the shores of the Mediterranean can be brought into relation with history; and in that region that material was gradually being superseded by iron in the days of Hesiod, and in the days when Jabin went to war with the Israelites with nine hundred chariots of iron. If, then, we can identify the Bronze Age of Central and Northern Europe with that of the Mediterranean, we may in some sense connect it with history. The very presence of bronze in Northern Europe implies an extensive commerce, as well as a considerable knowledge of metallurgy, for it consists of nine parts of copper and one of tin, the latter being of very limited distribution. The bronze implements, also, throughout Northern and Middle Europe, are made essentially of the same pattern, and, although they present minor and local differences, they show what Professor Owen would term a unity of type running through all the variations of individual form. It is very clear, therefore, that the bronze civilisation proceeded from one centre, and not from many isolated and independent centres, for in the latter case the unity of type would not have been preserved. The knowledge of bronze must necessarily have been preceded by the separate use of copper and of tin, and yet there are but very few cases in which implements of the former have been discovered, while there are absolutely none of the latter. This would show that our bronze civilisation was not indigenous, but introduced from without. The idea advanced by Dr. Wright, that bronze weapons were introduced among the barbarians of the North by the Romans, may be dismissed at once for the following reasons: they have never been found in association with Roman remains, they are very abundant in Denmark and Ireland, where the Roman arms never penetrated, and they are different in form from those used by Roman soldiers, whose swords were made of iron and not of bronze. An analysis also proves that the bronze of this age is an alloy of copper and tin, with a few impurities, such as nickel, and sometimes a trace of lead, while the Roman bronze contains large quantities of lead. Any one of these objections is fatal to his theory. The Romans, therefore, cannot be viewed as the introducers of bronze. The inquiry as to how the bronze was introduced falls naturally into two heads-the distribution of the metals of which it is composed, and the form and ornamentation of the bronze implements. The possessors of the mines of tin and copper must necessarily have been intimately connected with the bronze civilisation. Copper is found in very many localities in Europe, while tin occurs but rarely. The latter has been worked for an unknown length of time in Cornwall, as well as in Bohemia and Saxony. The Iberian peninsula, also, in ancient times furnished an enormous supply of tin. In 6 * 6 every corner,' writes Mr. Howorth, where a trace of metal ' is found, from the mountains of Granada to the obscure corners ' of Tras os Montes, Algarve, and Biscay, heaps of scoriæ, 'unchronicled antiquities, and labyrinths of ancient workings ' exist.' In the geological description of Galicia, Don Guillermo Schultz, the Director of the Spanish School of Mines, testifies to the abundance of tin in that province. Sir John Lubbock, indeed, agrees with Sir G. C. Lewis, that Spain did not furnish very much tin to the ancient commerce, but we would refer anyone who has doubts upon the subject, to Mr. Howorth's able essay on the Archæology of Bronze.' The traces of old workings in the Iberian peninsula are enormously larger than those of Cornwall; and, therefore, the amount of tin furnished to the ancient commerce by the former must have been proportionately greater. Nor is there any doubt as to the people by whom these Spanish mines were worked. The mineral wealth of Spain had attracted the attention of the Phoenicians twelve or fifteen centuries before Christ, and they probably also worked the mines of Cornwall, but the evidence is not altogether decisive. The people famous for bronze, and who had possession certainly of the great tin mines of Spain and probably of Britain, must necessarily have carried on a traffic of some sort or another with the barbarians of north-western Europe. The amber, also, mentioned by Homer as being sold by the Phoenicians, and by Herodotus as being obtained from the Eridanus,† a river opening on the Northern Sea, and identified by Sir J. Y. Simpson with the Eider, would be a powerful incentive to their maritime adventure. From their very position, therefore, in the ancient world, their influence must have been felt in Northern Europe. Professor Nilsson believes that the Phoenicians were the introducers of bronze, and to their influence he assigns the unity Journal of the Ethnological Society, Feb. 26, 1867, p. 10. of type of the implements and weapons which are discovered throughout Europe. His principal arguments are as follows. In the remarkable tomb near Kivik, in Christianstad, 'human figures are represented which may fairly be said to have a Phoenician or Egyptian appearance. On another of the stones an obelisk is represented, which Professor Nilsson regards as symbolical of the sun-god; and it is certainly remarkable that, in an ancient ruin in Malta, characterised by other decorations of the Bronze Age types, a somewhat similar obelisk was discovered. We know also that in many countries Baal, the god of the Phoenicians, was worshipped under the form of a conical stone. 'Nor is this by any means the only case in which Professor Nilsson finds traces of Baal-worship in Scandinavia. Indeed, the festival of Baal, or Balder, was, he tells us, celebrated on midsummer night in Scania, and far up into Norway, almost to the Loffoden Islands, until within the last fifty years. A wood fire was made upon a hill or mountain, and the people of the neighbourhood gathered together in order, like Baal's prophets of old, to dance round it, shouting and singing. This midsummer's-night fire has even retained in some parts the ancient name of "Baldersbal" or Baldersfire. Leopold von Buch long ago suggested that this custom could not have originated in a country where at midsummer the sun is never lost sight of, and where, consequently, the smoke only, not the fire, is visible. A similar custom also prevailed until lately in some parts of our islands. Baal has given the name to many Scandinavian localities, as, for instance, the Baltic, the Great and Little Belt, Belte terga, Baleshaugen, Balestranden, &c.' (Lubbock, p. 70.) Sir James Simpson adds to these Belan in Montgomeryshire, and the Baal Hills in Yorkshire. A second argument in favour of the Phoenician theory is derived from the ornamentation of the bronzes, and especially of two curious vasewaggons found in Sweden and Mecklenburg, which, according to Sir J. Lubbock, certainly appear to have been like the vases made for Solomon's Temple, and described in the First Book of Kings. They are considered, however, by Dr. Wiberg to be of Etruscan origin. The double spiral so commonly found on bronze articles in Scandinavia and North Germany is said to be Egyptian and Assyrian; and, as the Phoenicians were in the habit of copying the works of art of other peoples, this form may have been conveyed to the North by them. It was, however, also used by the Etruscans. In spite of these arguments, a comparison of the few works of art which are undoubtedly Phoenician with those of the Bronze Age, show that there is not very much in common between them. The Phoenician influence certainly must have been felt, but we must look in another direction for the unity of type of the northern bronzes. Sir John Lubbock very pertinently remarks that the ornamentation in right lines, so common on the bronzes of Northern Europe, cannot be assigned to the Phoenicians. His second objection, however, that as the Phoenicians were acquainted with iron as well as bronze, they would have imported them both at the same time, seems to us to be invalid, because the trade would necessarily depend altogether upon the demand and upon the scarcity and cost of the supply. The Phoenicians, moreover, were famous for their bronze, rather than their iron. If, however, we must give up the Phoenician theory as explaining all the facts, Mr. Howorth in this country and Dr. Wiberg† in Germany, working independently, agree in assigning to the Etruscans the greater share of the honour of introducing the civilisation of the South among the barbarian tribes of Northern and Middle Europe, and they bring forward very strong evidence that the Greeks also kept up the trade after the extinction of the Etruscan power. M. Noel's discovery of an Etruscan tomb at Caëre, with sculptures on the walls representing the domestic life of the time, proves that the implements and weapons characteristic of the Bronze Age north of the Alps, were known to the Etruscans. The sickles for reaping are of the same character as those found in Germany and Sweden, as well in the pile-dwellings of Switzerland and Lombardy. The lancet-shaped swords also are the same, and the peculiar sigmoid trumpet, the lituus, which the Romans borrowed from the Etruscans, bears a strong likeness to those found by MM. Nilsson and Worsaae in Denmark and Schonen. The former writer describes them as twisted like the horn of a bison. The bronze waggons, likewise, which Professor Nilsson considers to be Phoenician, are extremely common in the Etruscan tombs. Dr. Wiberg's inference from the bas-reliefs of the tomb at Caëre is considerably strengthened by a collection of bronzes in the British Museum, said to be Etruscan. The spear-heads, arrow-heads, and socketed celts are of such a character that if found in Britain and Ireland they would be assigned by all archæologists to the Bronze Age. In fine, the evidence is of that precise and definite sort which is wanting to establish the Phoenician hypothesis. The Etruscans were great workers in the noble metals of ancient times; and they carried on an extensive commerce with ancient Greece. So intimately, indeed, were they connected with the Greeks, that it is very hard to distinguish * The Archæology of Bronze, Quart. Ethnol. Journ., 1867. between the works of art of the two peoples. According to the testimony of Polybius, the Etruscans originally extended as far north as the river Po, and traded with the Celts, by whom they were eventually driven from the rich plains of Northern Italy. It is also reasonable to suppose that formerly they occupied the Canton of the Grisons and a part of the Tyrol, because in the days of Livy an Etruscan dialect was spoken in those regions. We can, therefore, trace the Etruscan influence north of the Alps, not merely by the identity of style exhibited by the bronze articles in Northern Europe as compared with those of the Etruscan tombs, but also by an appeal to historical records. It is very probable that they obtained their tin from the mines of Saxony and Bohemia, for it would have been impossible for such skilful metal workers to have overlooked those important sources of supply within the boundaries of their trade. Dr. Wiberg has proved that the Greek colonies in Italy gradually learned the art of metalworking from the Etruscans, and that their chief places of manufacture were Brundusium and Tarentum; and he shows how they subsequently usurped the overland trade of the Etruscans. He recognises the evidence of Greek and Italian art on the north side of the Pass of the Great St. Bernard, in Switzerland, and in the Valley of the Rhone. How long the Etruscans worked the copper-mines of Bruttium, and how long they carried on their commerce in bronze overland with the cis-Alpine nations, are questions that cannot possibly be answered. Nor can we ascertain the commercial relations that must from their very position have existed between them and the Phoenicians. The style of the bronze weapons in France, Germany, and Scandinavia points more strongly towards the former than towards the latter people, but very possibly bronze implements of the Etruscan type may have been manufactured by the Phoenicians for the north-western trade, just as our Birmingham cutlers manufacture creases for the Malays, and the cotton-spinners of Lancashire imitate the patterns of the people of the East. The Greek influence probably was not so great as that of the Etruscans or Phoenicians, because they came later into the field. We may therefore fairly ascribe the knowledge of bronze in the North to the trade which was carried on with these civilised peoples. The objection that Etruscan and Greek works of art are of a much higher character than those found in the North, falls to the ground, because it is hardly likely that costly objets *M. le Hon, 'L'Homme fossile,' p. 207. |