Page:VCH Northamptonshire 1.djvu/181

 EARLY MAN be so rich in early remains, has also yielded a rare specimen in the form of a handled cup of reddish-coloured earthenware which belongs to this age ; this cup bears diamond-shaped patterns incised upon the body, made apparently by the impressions of a thumb nail. The only other handled cups of this period of which the writer has been able to obtain any information are but four in number : the first from a barrow at Goodmanham Wold in Yorkshire, which bears a different decoration from the others ; out of 220 barrows opened by Canon Greenwell this was the only handled cup he obtained. One which is called the Denzell cup and is now in the British Museum was found in a barrow in Cornwall. The third was found in a cairn near Picker- ing in Yorkshire by Mr. Thomas Bateman' in 1850, and the fourth at Ely. This is apparently of superior make and ornamentation. It is of interest to note that these last three cups, though found in such widely separated parts of England as Cornwall, Cambridgeshire and Yorkshire, are ornamented with a diamond-shaped design very similar to that on our cup from Brixworth. Of the weapons and implements of bronze our county has yielded few in number. There is a well preserved leaf-shaped sword dug up from land belonging to an old manor called Wolfage in Brixworth parish about the year 1846. Remains of two rapier-shaped blades have been discovered, one at Marston Trussel and the other at Pytchley near Kettering. The latter was found underneath the parish church when it was undergoing alteration, and at the same time some ' kist- vaens ' were discovered. Palstaves of bronze have been picked up at Aynho, Staverton, Aston-le-Walls and Thenford ; socketed celts or axes which are supposed to have been used quite late in this period have been obtained from near Daventry, from Dallington, Castor, Rushden, Eye near Peterborough, and from the precincts of Peterborough itself, Naseby, Wappenham, etc., and there is preserved at the Hall at Canon's Ashby a fine specimen of a leaf-shaped spearhead found in the neighbour- hood. A small but early form of a drinking cup, marked with a herring-bone pattern which perhaps belongs to this age, was found in the parish of Fotheringhay in the surface soil above the gravels which yielded a Palaeolithic flint implement. Mention may be made here of the discovery of two hoards of bronze, though they occurred just outside the county : one at Wyming- ton in Bedfordshire, where more than sixty socketed celts were found on Mr. Goosey's farm in i860 ; and a few years ago Mr. Whitbread of Roade purchased at a sale at Stantonbury in Bucks a lot of broken bronze weapons, etc., which he has since learnt were found at Stanton- bury. In this lot (bought at the sale for is.) were portions of seven socketed celts, one complete palstave, a leaf-shaped sword in four pieces and the remains of two spearheads. To obtain a fuller knowledge of man in the Bronze age we must from 18+8 to 1858, by Thomas Bateman (1868). 143
 * Ten fears' Diggings in Celtic and Saxon Grave Hills in the Counties of Derby, Staffiird end fori,