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Triskeles, Palmettes and Horse-Brooches*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

Extract

This paper deals with an unusual example of the triskele and the significance of the pattern in general; and with the intrusion of scrolls and palmettes which transformed it. One of the later patterns thus evolved, decorates a horse-brooch; and the paper ends with a discussion of the function of these newly-identified objects.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1953

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References

page 47 note 1 Fox, , A Find of the Early Iron Age from Llyn Cerrig bach, Anglesey pl. 1, Cardiff, 1946Google Scholar.

page 47 note 2 Archaeologia Cambrensis, 1928, p. 283Google Scholar, fig. 16: Celtic Ornament, p. 56 and fig. 22, 1933Google Scholar.

page 47 note 3 Wrought on iron dies. For repetitive workof this sort, see Atkinson, Donald, Report on Excavations at Wroxeter, 19231927: 1942, pl. 52 and pp. 216–7Google Scholar; also Fox, op. cit., p. 21. The moulded angular border of the piece was ‘run off’ by a subsequent process.

page 47 note 4 Anderson, J., “Scotland in Pagan Times”, Iron Age, fig. 113Google Scholar.

page 47 note 5 Fox, op. cit., fig. 3, p. 8.

page 48 note 1 Fox, , ‘The Study of Celtic Metalwork in Britain’, The Advancement of Science, VIII, 30, 1951, p. 191. British AssociationGoogle Scholar.

page 48 note 2 Ant. J., XIV, 1934, p. 60Google Scholar.

page 48 note 3 Compare the cell-like decoration on many pieces in the Seven Sisters hoard, Glamorgan; Arch. Camb., 1905, p. 127Google Scholar. Also Grimes, W. F., Guide to the Prehistory of Wales, 1939, Nat. Mus. Wales, fig. 40, 1, 2, 4, p. 118Google Scholar.

page 49 note 1 I originally described this development as the ‘interlocking of the roundels,’ Arch, Camb., 1945, p. 208Google Scholar, and Llyn Cerrig Bach Report, 1946, p. 54Google Scholar.

page 49 note 2 e.g., ‘Hunsbury scabbard’, P.P.S., 1950, p. 8 (redrawn by ProfessorPiggott, )Google Scholar; Mayer mirror’, Ant. J., 1948, pl. XVI, p. 130Google Scholar. For the Colchester mirror, Ant. J., 1948, p. 124Google Scholar.

page 49 note 3 SirKendrick, Thomas in Anglo Saxon Art, 1938, p. 10Google Scholar; Henry, F., La sculpture irlandaise, 1932, I, p. 38 ff.Google Scholar

page 49 note 4 See Fox, and Hull, , ‘The Incised Ornament on the Celtic Mirror from Colchester’, Ant. J., 1948, fig. 4, p. 128Google Scholar and fig. 5, p. 129. This paper contains quotations from Dr Jacobsthal's Early Celtic Art.

page 50 note 1 Smith, R. A., Ant. J., VI, 1926, p. 277Google Scholar; Jacobsthal, op. cit., p. 95.

page 50 note 2 Best illustrated in Picture Book of Ancient British Art, by Piggott, S. and Daniel, G. E., 1951Google Scholar, pls. 38–40.

page 50 note 3 As Jacobsthal, op. cit., pl. 272, nos. 331, 333 and 328–30, 332 and 334. See also Fox and Hull, op. cit., pp. 127–30.

page 50 note 4 Ant.J., 1948. pl. XVI.

page 52 note 1 Early Celtic Art, p. 157.

page 52 note 2 The Advancement of Science, VIII, 30, p. 191, British AssociationGoogle Scholar.

page 52 note 3 Fox, loc. cit., p. 185.

page 54 note 1 The third brooch is for the crupper, and of a different design.

page 54 note 2 One is broken off, as is shown on the original engraving, my plate IV.

page 54 note 3 My wife notes that Corinium Dobunorum was a great centre for cults—the Mothers, the three ‘hooded-men,’ the horned man (Cernunnos ?) and the Jupiter Column cult, (which was Celtic). In Gloucestershire generally are many fertility cults; Sul Minerva at Bath is famous, of course. Epona, a goddess (of fertility) associated with horses, must not be left out of account, though there is at present little evidence of her cult in Celtic Britain. In relief sculpture on the Continent (Gaul and Germany) she is shown bestriding a horse or seated sideways on a horse; on one of the latter representations she has a ‘horse-blanket’ under her (Germania Romana, Bilder Atlas, IV, Taf. XXI, 3, from Leonberg). In the same publication (XXI, 1) a relief from Stuttgart shows two registers: in the upper she is seated with horses standing on either side; in the lower a four-wheeled waggon with driver and 3 horses awaits her; there is a throne on the waggon. A sacrifice of a boar is taking place, also, in this register.

page 54 note 4 1 inch o.s. Sheet 165: 342–98. See Archaeologia, XIV, p. 103Google Scholar, lines 24-8.