Part 13 (2/2)

Possibly, suggests Sir W. Wilde, they may have been the remains of mother and child.[166]

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOLD HEAD-DRESS, R.I.A.]

The collection of antiquities in the Royal Irish Academy, furnishes abundant evidence that the pagan Irish were well skilled in the higher arts of working in metals. If the arbitrary division of the ages of stone, bronze, and iron, can be made to hold good, we must either suppose that the Irish Celt was possessed of extraordinary mental powers, by which he developed the mechanical arts gradually, or that, with successive immigrations, he obtained an increase of knowledge from exterior sources. The bardic annals indicate the latter theory. We have already given several ill.u.s.trations of the ruder weapons. The ill.u.s.tration appended here may give some idea of the skill obtained by our pagan ancestors in working gold. This ornament, which is quite complete, though fractured in two places, stands 11-1/2 inches high. It weighs 16 oz. 10 dwts. 13 grs. The gold of which it is formed is very red. It was procured with the Sirr Collection, and is said to have been found in the county Clare.[167] Our readers are indebted to the kindness of the Council of the Royal Irish Academy, for the permission to depict these and the other rare articles from the collection which are inserted in our pages.

The amount of gold ornaments which have been found in Ireland at various times, has occasioned much conjecture as to whether the material was found in Ireland or imported. It is probable that auriferous veins existed, which were worked out, or that some may even now exist which are at present unknown. The discovery of gold ornaments is one of the many remarkable confirmations of the glowing accounts given by our bardic annalists of Erinn's ancient glories. O'Hartigan thus describes the wealth and splendour of the plate possessed by the ancient monarchs who held court at Tara:--

”Three hundred cupbearers distributed Three times fifty choice goblets Before each party of great numbers, Which were of pure strong carbuncle,[168]

Or gold or of silver all.”

Dr. Petrie observes that this statement is amply verified by the magnificent gold ornaments, found within a few yards of this very spot, now in the possession of the Royal Irish Academy. We shall see, at a later period, when the cursing of Tara will demand a special notice of its ancient glories, how amply the same writer has vindicated the veracity of Celtic annalists on this ground also.

A remarkable resemblance has been noticed between the pagan military architecture of Ireland, and the early Pelasgian monuments in Greece.

They consist of enclosures, generally circular, of ma.s.sive clay walls, built of small loose stones, from six to sixteen feet thick. These forts or fortresses are usually entered by a narrow doorway, wider at the bottom than at the top, and are of Cyclopean architecture. Indeed, some of the remains in Ireland can only be compared to the pyramids of Egypt, so ma.s.sive are the blocks of stone used in their construction. As this stone is frequently of a kind not to be found in the immediate neighbourhood, the means used for their transportation are as much a matter of surprise and conjecture, as those by which they were placed in the position in which they are found. The most remarkable of these forts may still be seen in the Isles of Arran, on the west coast of Galway; there are others in Donegal, Mayo, and in Kerry. Some of these erections have chambers in their ma.s.sive walls, and in others stairs are found round the interior of the wall; these lead to narrow platforms, varying from eight to forty-three feet in length, on which the warriors or defenders stood. The fort of Dunmohr, in the middle island of Arran, is supposed to be at least 2,000 years old. Besides these forts, there was the private house, a stone habitation, called a _clochann_, in which an individual or family resided; the large circular dome-roofed buildings, in which probably a community lived; and the rath, intrenched and stockaded.

But stone was not the only material used for places of defence or domestic dwellings; the most curious and interesting of ancient Irish habitations is the _crannoge_, a name whose precise etymology is uncertain, though there is little doubt that it refers in some way to the peculiar nature of the structure.

The crannoges were formed on small islets or shallows of clay or marl in the centre of a lake, which were probably dry in summer, but submerged in winter. These little islands, or mounds, were used as a foundation for this singular habitation. Piles of wood, or heaps of stone and bones driven into or heaped on the soil, formed the support of the crannoge.

They were used as places of retreat or concealment, and are usually found near the ruins of such old forts or castles as are in the vicinity of lakes or marshes. Sometimes they are connected with the mainland by a causeway, but usually there is no appearance of any; and a small canoe has been, with but very few exceptions, discovered in or near each crannoge.

Since the investigation of these erections in Ireland, others have been discovered in the Swiss lakes of a similar kind, and containing, or rather formed on, the same extraordinary amount of bones heaped up between the wooden piles.

The peculiar objects called celts, and the weapons and domestic utensils of this or an earlier period, are a subject of scarcely less interest.

The use of the celt has fairly perplexed all antiquarian research. Its name is derived not, as might be supposed, from the nation to whom this distinctive appellation was given, but from the Latin word _celtis_, a chisel. It is not known whether these celts, or the round, flat, sharp-edged chisels, were called _Lia Miledh_, ”warriors' stones.” In the record of the battle of the Ford of Comar, Westmeath, the use of this instrument is thus described:--

”There came not a man of Lohar's people without a broad green spear, nor without a dazzling s.h.i.+eld, nor without a _Liagh-lamha-laich_ (a champion's hand stone), stowed away in the hollow cavity of his s.h.i.+eld.... And Lohar carried his stone like each of his men; and seeing the monarch his father standing in the ford with Ceat, son of Magach, at one side, and Connall Cearnach at the other, to guard him, he grasped his battle-stone quickly and dexterously, and threw it with all his strength, and with unerring aim, at the king his father; and the ma.s.sive stone pa.s.sed with a swift rotatory motion towards the king, and despite the efforts of his two brave guardians, it struck him on the breast, and laid him prostrate in the ford. The king, however, recovered from the shock, arose, and placing his foot upon the formidable stone, pressed it into the earth, where it remains to this day, with a third part of it over ground, and the print of the king's foot visible upon it.”

Flint proper, or chalk flint, is found but in few places in Ireland; these are princ.i.p.ally in the counties of Antrim, Down, and Derry. In the absence of a knowledge of the harder metals, flint and such-like substances were invaluable as the only material that could be fas.h.i.+oned into weapons of defence, and used to shape such rude clothing as was then employed. The scarcity of flint must have rendered these weapons of great value in other districts. Splitting, chipping, and polis.h.i.+ng, and this with tools as rude as the material worked on, were the only means of manufacturing such articles; and yet such was the perfection, and, if the expression be applicable, the amount of artistic skill attained, that it seems probable flint-chipping was a special trade, and doubtless a profitable one to those engaged in it.

When flints were used as arrows, either in battle or in the chase, a bow was easily manufactured from the oak and birch trees with which the island was thickly wooded. It was bent by a leathern thong, or the twisted intestine of some animal. The handles of the lance or javelin--formidable weapons, if we may judge from the specimens in the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy--were also formed of wood; but these have perished in the lapse of ages, and left only the strangely and skilfully formed implement of destruction.

Among primitive nations, the tool and the weapon differed but little.

The hatchet which served to fell the tree, was as readily used to cleave open the head of an enemy. The knife, whether of stone or hard wood, carved the hunter's prey, or gave a deathstroke to his enemy. Such weapons or implements have, however, frequently been found with metal articles, under circ.u.mstances which leave little doubt that the use of the former was continued long after the discovery of the superior value of the latter. Probably, even while the Tuatha De Danann artificers were framing their more refined weapons for the use of n.o.bles and knights, the rude fas.h.i.+oner of flint-arrows and spear-heads still continued to exercise the craft he had learned from his forefathers, for the benefit of poorer or less fastidious warriors.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CROMLECH IN THE PHOENIX PARK.

The urn and necklace, figured at page 154, were found in this tomb.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CLONDALKIN ROUND TOWER.]

FOOTNOTES:

[144] _Authors_.--Strabo, l. iv. p. 197; Suetonius, _V. Cla._; Pliny, _Hist. Nat._ l. xxv. c. 9. Pliny mentions having seen the serpent's egg, and describes it.

[145] _Virgil_.--_Ec._. 6, v. 73.

[146] _Year_.--Dio. Sic. tom. i. p. 158.

[147] _Magi_.--Magi is always used in Latin as the equivalent for the Irish word which signifies druid. See the _Vitae S. Columbae_, p. 73; see also Reeves' note to this word.

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