Page:VCH Lancaster 1.djvu/268

A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE number of interesting interments of that age, while here and there at different places—Bolton, Darwen, Blackburn, and elsewhere—isolated burials have from time to time been brought to light.

The evidence of burial places ranks first in importance. As usual there is little or no trace of the places where man really lived, although the localities where implements have been found, particularly in accumulation, is some suggestion. The ancient canoes found at Preston, Martin Mere, Barton, and Irlam, are better evidence of settlement, but the precise period of these objects themselves is not at all certain. In lack of direct testimony the most probable indication is, then, the vicinity of funereal mounds. Save for such indirect (and non-exclusive) testimony there is little guide to the problem—with one notable exception. The moors and hilltops of the Pennine range present a tract less liable than elsewhere to the disturbance of cultivation, and have yielded to the patient researches of enthusiastic investigators the knowledge that at a remote period numbers of flint-using people dwelt there in settlements, finding the situation probably as advantageous for their own safety as it was for descending to the woods and valleys for food. There is little trace of man, but certain evidence of his handiwork in myriads of flints, flakes and chips, arrow-heads and knives, hammer-stones and the cores from which the flakes have been chipped, even his stores of flint and graphite, etc., abounding chiefly in the range of hills that lies eastward and northward from Rochdale and Ashton-under-Lyne. The flint is not geologically indigenous, and the absence of metal tools amongst the wealth of stone objects throughout this tract points to a settlement there of a neolithic population as early at least as present evidence shows man to have found his way at all into the county.

Of the metal-using or Bronze Age which followed there is more general evidence of remains though less definite evidence of settlement. Undoubtedly the group of bronze implements containing a great spear, dagger, and eight axe-heads, found at Winmarleigh in the north of Lancashire, ranks first, though late in date, among the relics of that age. The vicinity of Warrington, and the range of upland lying north of Manchester by Bolton-le-Moors, also bear indirect witness of habitation in the weapons and interments which have come to light. The mountain range to the east, and more particularly the river valleys and the sites of former marshes now reclaimed, contribute also their portion of evidence.

The later Celtic period, characterized by the introduction also of iron among the metals worked, is represented somewhat sparsely, but some of the remains of this time are of exceptional character. The iron sword from Warton, north of Lancaster, in the British Museum; the bronze sword-sheath from Pilling Moss, in the museum at Salford; and especially the bronze torque found at Mow Road, near Rochdale, now in private possession, rank among noteworthy examples of late Celtic art.

The classification of objects under three main divisions called the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age respectively, is conventional and generally adopted but it should be recognized at the outset as a mere convenient terminology, liable, as is often the case, to error of general inference. The basis of the nomenclature is the most characteristic material employed in 212