Page:VCH Suffolk 1.djvu/313

 EARLY MAN tion, and are sometimes found contained within cinerary urns. The purpose of this kind of vessel, which is sometimes furnished with a lid or cover, is a question which has given rise to much speculation among antiquaries, but the point remains unsettled. The use indicated by the name appears improbable, but there is another suggested use which certainly seems reasonable, namely, that these vessels were used for conveying fire to the funereal pyre, as part of the ritual accompanying cremation ; but this theory requires confirmation. Much important information as to the casting of bronze articles, the trading in bronze implements, and the evolution and contemporaneity or otherwise of forms of bronze implements, has been derived from certain deposits or hoards of metal. These originally were hidden in the soil by the possessor and not recovered until modern times, when by some chance ex- cavation they have been brought to the light of day. Hoards of bronze antiquities comprise a considerable variety of new and old implements, ingots of rough metal or cakes of copper, &c., but they fall conveniently into three main groups or classes, viz : (a) Personal hoards, containing the personal property of individuals who had buried the metallic objects underground for security, and presumably forgotten the site, or at any rate, for one reason or another, never recovered the treasure ; (6) Merchants' hoards, comprising the stock of newly cast implements or weapons ready for use, and probably carried about from place to place for exchange ; and (c) Founders' hoards, consisting of broken or disused weapons, imple- ments, &c. collected for the purpose of re-melting and often accompanied by moulds for the making of fresh castings in bronze. The evidence of accumulations of this character for the diffusion of Bronze-Age population and the activity of Bronze-Age commerce is of the greatest archaeological value. Another point upon which bronze hoards afford valuable evidence is the succession of stages in the development of the form of implements, etc. Within certain limits they prove what objects are contemporary. They show, for example, that tanged implements of any kind are rarely found with socketed celts ; that flanged celts and palstaves are sometimes found together, but that palstaves are often found with socketed celts ; and that both metal moulds and rough lumps of copper are generally associated with hoards in which socketed celts are found. Knife-daggers and early flat celts are found only very rarely in hoards ; but they occur with some frequency in associiation with interments in Bronze- Age barrows. From this it seems safe to infer that in the earliest periods of the British Bronze Age (to which flat celts and knife-daggers belong) metallic tools were esteemed very highly ; indeed, they may have been regarded with superstition ; or they may have been buried with the dead to serve as the most useful objects for life in a future state ; or possibly the art of melting down the old metal tools and casting new ones was unknown. It is clear, after a careful study of many hoards of Bronze-Age antiquities, that flat celts, and tanged implements generally, belong to the early part of the Bronze Period, whilst palstaves, socketed celts, and socketed articles generally are of later date. I 265 34