IV.—Hoards of Neolithic Celts

Extract

More than anywhere else in Europe the Neolithic Period has been studied in Scandinavia, where finds are exceptionally rich, and circumstances have made a sequence possible. Isolated attempts have been made to formulate an evolution series in France (Déchelette, Manuel, i, 514-16; L'Homme préhistorique, 1907, p. 71) and Germany (Prähistorische Zeitschrift, vi (1914), p. 29), but the material is not so abundant, and association of types in hoards or burials not frequent enough to complete the undertaking. Our Fellow Mr. E. C. R. Armstrong has described some associated finds of Irish neolithic celts in Proc. Royal Irish Academy, xxxiv, c, no. 6, but attention in England has been rather distracted by the abundance of Drift implements, and there has been a tendency to class all surface finds as neolithic, internal evidence alone being deemed insufficient to justify a chronological arrangement. Groups of contemporary specimens buried as hoards or deposited with the dead in any kind of grave have been provokingly rare; and an offer made by Mr. Algernon A. Hankey to exhibit a hoard of celts to the Society and subsequently to present them to the British Museum was therefore accepted with enthusiasm. Opportunity was taken to borrow from Mr. Russell J. Colman, who readily acceded to the request, another hoard of five celts found near Norwich; and since the paper was read, the Earl of Leicester kindly lent the President a group of four, also from Norfolk, for examination and inclusion in the present series, to which the Curator of Norwich Castle Museum has also contributed, through Miss G. V. Barnard, outlines of two other hoards from the same county. There are probably other datable groups in public or private collections, but it would be futile to delay publication of those above mentioned till a thorough search of all the literature and museums in the kingdom had been undertaken. These will at least form the basis of a chronological scheme for neolithic celts, the value of which can be estimated by the ease or difficulty of incorporating other groups that may come to light.