CHAPTER II.

THE BRONZE AGE.

THER

HERE are four principal theories as to the Bronze age. According to some archæologists, the discovery, or introduction, of bronze was unattended by any other great or sudden change in the condition of the people; but was the result, and is the evidence of a gradual and peaceable development. Some attribute the bronze arms and implements, found in Northern Europe, to the Roman armies, some to the Phoenician merchants; while others, again, consider that the men of the Stone age were replaced by a new and more civilized people of Indo-European race, coming from the East; who, bringing with them a knowledge of bronze, overran Europe, and dispossessed-in some places entirely destroying the original, or rather the earlier inhabitants.

It is not, indeed, necessary to suppose that the introduction of bronze should have been effected everywhere in the same manner; so far, for instance, as Switzerland and Ireland are concerned, Dr. Keller* and Sir W. R. Wilde† may be quite right in considering that the so-called "primitive" population did not belong to a different race from that subsequently characterised by the use of bronze.

Still, though it is evident that the knowledge of bronze must necessarily have been preceded by the separate use of copper and of tin; yet no single implement of the latter metal * Mittheil. der Antiquär. Gesellsch. in Zurich, Bd. xiv. H. 6. Wilde, 1. c. p. 360.

has been hitherto found in Europe, while those of copper are extremely rare. Hungary and Ireland, indeed, have been supposed to form partial exceptions to this rule. The geographical position of the former country is probably a sufficient explanation; and as far as Ireland is concerned, it may perhaps be worth while to examine how far that country really forms an exception. In the great Museum at Dublin there are 725 celts and celt-like chisels, 282 swords and daggers, and 276 lances, javelins, and arrow-heads; yet out of these 1283 weapons only 30 celts and one sword-blade are said to be of pure copper. I say "are said to be," because they have not been analysed, but are supposed to be copper only from the "physical properties and ostensible colour of the metal:” indeed one of these very celts, which was analysed by Mr. Mallet, was found to contain a small percentage of tin. It is possible that for some of the purposes to which celts were applied, copper may have been nearly as useful as bronze, and at any rate it might sometimes have happened that from a deficiency of tin, some implements would be made of copper only.

*

Taking these facts into consideration, Ireland certainly does not appear to present any strong evidence of an age of copper, while no one has ever pretended to find either there, or any where else in Europe, a trace of any separate use of tin.*

Sir W. R. Wilde himself admits it to be "remarkable that so few antique copper implements have been found, although a knowledge of that metal must have been the preliminary stage in the manufacture of bronze." He thinks, however, that "the circumstance may be accounted for, either by supposing that but a short time elapsed between the knowledge

One even of these is with good reason considered by Dr. Wilde to be an American specimen.

+ It was sometimes used for purposes of ornamentation, but that does not of course affect the present argument.

BRONZE IMPLEMENTS IN DIFFERENT COUNTRIES. 33

of smelting and casting copper ore, and the introduction of tin, and subsequent manufacture and use of bronze; or from the probability of nearly all such articles having been recast and converted into bronze, subsequent to the introduction of tin, which renders them harder, sharper, and more valuable."*

There is, however, another circumstance which strongly militates against this theory of a gradual and independent development of metallurgical knowledge in different countries, and that is the fact which has been broadly stated by Mr. Wright, and whic' I may, perhaps, repeat here, that whenever we find the bronze swords or celts, "whether in Ireland in the far west, in Scotland, in distant Scandinavia, in Germany, or still further east in the Sclavonic countries, they are the same-not similar in character, but identical." The great resemblance of stone implements found in different parts of the world may be satisfactorily accounted for by the similarity of the material, and the simplicity of the forms. But this argument cannot be applied to the bronze arms and implements. Not only are several varieties of celts found throughout Europe, but some of the swords, knives, daggers, etc., are so similar, that they seem as if they must have been cast by the same maker. Compare, for instance, figs. 1, 3, and 9, which represent Irish celts, with 10, 12, and 11, which are copied from Danish specimens; the three swords, figs. 14, 15, and 16, which come respectively from Ireland, Sweden, and Switzerland, and the two, figs. 17 and 18, of which the first is Swiss, the second Scandinavian. It would have been easy to multiply examples of this similarity, and it is not going too far to say that these resemblances cannot be the result of accident. On the other hand, it must be admitted that each country has certain

Wilde, l. c. p. 357,

34

BRONZE IMPLEMENTS NOT OF

minor peculiarities. Neither the forms nor the ornaments are exactly similar. In Denmark and Mecklenburgh, spiral ornaments are most common; farther south, these are replaced by ring ornaments and lines. The Danish swords generally have solid, and richly decorated handles, as in figs. 17-23, while those found in Great Britain (fig. 14) terminate in a plate which was riveted to pieces of wood or bone. Again, the British lance-heads frequently have loops at the side of the shaft-hole, as in fig. 27, which is never the case with Danish specimens.

The discovery of moulds in Ireland, Scotland, England, Switzerland, Denmark, and elsewhere, shows that the art of casting in bronze was known and practised in many countries. Under these circumstances, it appears most probable that the knowledge of metal is one of those great discoveries which Europe owes to the East, and that the use of copper was not introduced into our Continent, until it had been observed that by the addition of a small quantity of tin it was rendered harder and more valuable.

I have already, in the first chapter, given the reasons which render it evident to me that the bronze weapons are not of Roman origin. These may be summed up as follows: Firstly. They have never been found in company with Roman pottery, or other remains of the Roman period.

Secondly. The ornamentation is not Roman in its character. Thirdly. The bronze swords do not resemble in form those used by Roman soldiers.

Fourthly. The Latin word "ferrum" was used as synonymous with a sword, showing that the Romans always used iron.

Fifthly. Bronze implements are very abundant in some countries, as for instance in Denmark and Ireland, which were never invaded by Roman armies.

Moreover, the bronze used by the Romans contained,

generally, a large proportion of lead, which is never the case in that of the Bronze age.

My friend Mr. Wright* mentions, three cases in which bronze swords are supposed to have been found together with Roman remains. The first instance has been already alluded to (p. 12). As regards the other two, he has, unfortunately, mislaid the references, and I have therefore been unable to verify the statements. Even granting that there is no mistake about these cases, and that the facts are as he supposes, they would prove nothing. Bronze swords are excellent and beautiful weapons, and would certainly have been preserved as curiosities, sometimes even employed, long after they had been replaced in general use by iron. Mr. Wright lays much stress on the fact, that the bronze weapons have generally been found near Roman stations, and Roman roads. As regards England, this is no doubt true, but we must remember that the whole of this country is intersected by Roman roads, many of which, moreover, were old lines of communication, long before Cæsar first landed on our coasts. He appears, however, to forget that bronze weapons are very common in Ireland and Denmark, where there are no Roman roads at all.

But Mr. Wright sees nothing in Great Britain which can be referred to ante-Roman times. The arms and implements of bronze he refers, as we have seen, to the Romans themselves, those of stone to the Britons, their contemporaries. Thus, having noticed that flint implements are more common near Bridlington than near Leeds,

"If these stone implements," he says, "belong to a period anterior to the Romans, and before the metals were extracted from the ground, why are they not found as frequently in the neighbourhood of Leeds as in that of Bridlington ?"

Lecture on the Early History of Leeds, p. 19.

+ Ibid. p. 12.