The Dowris Hoard is the name of an important

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...

hoard of over 200 objects found in Dowris, County Offaly,

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. Items from the deposit are currently split between two institutions: the National Museum of Ireland in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...

and the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. The hoard mostly of objects in bronze, was probably a ritual deposit, perhaps for religious purposes, though the records of the discovery, by farm labourers in the 1820s, do not allow to be sure if it was one deposit, or a series. Current thinking tends to see it as a series, possibly over a very long period, of ritual deposits into a lake. The importance of the hoard in Irish prehistory has led to the naming of the final phase of the Irish

Late Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second prin ...

(900–600 BC) as the Dowris Phase or period. Over time Irish prehistoric bronzesmiths had become highly adept at casting and working with sheet metal and the Dowris Phase reflects the culmination of this as well as an industrial growth in

metalworking Metalworking is the process of shaping and reshaping metals to create useful objects, parts, assemblies, and large scale structures. As a term it covers a wide and diverse range of processes, skills, and tools for producing objects on every scal ...

. During this period ironworking was already found on the European Continent, in

Halstatt culture The Hallstatt culture was the predominant Western and Central European culture of Late Bronze Age (Hallstatt A, Hallstatt B) from the 12th to 8th centuries BC and Early Iron Age Europe (Hallstatt C, Hallstatt D) from the 8th to 6th centuries B ...

"C", and arrived in

Britain Britain most often refers to: * The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands * Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...

, but did not reach Ireland. Until the culture was apparently disrupted around 600 BC, gold jewellery of superb quality was produced, as well as weapons, tools, trumpets and other kinds of objects in bronze, of which the Dowris Hoard has an exceptional selection.

Discovery

The Dowris Hoard was accidentally discovered in the 1820s by two men digging trenches for potatoes on a

peat bog A bog or bogland is a wetland that accumulates peat as a deposit of dead plant materials often mosses, typically sphagnum moss. It is one of the four main types of wetlands. Other names for bogs include mire, mosses, quagmire, and muskeg; a ...

near the shores of Lough Coura. During the

, the area was covered by a shallow lake, which later silted up in the late

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

. Dowris (also known as Doorosheath or Duros) is located near the village of Whigsborough, northeast of Birr in County Offaly, Ireland. The hoard subsequently came into the possession of William Parsons, 3rd

Earl of Rosse Earl of Rosse is a title that has been created twice in the Peerage of Ireland, both times for the Parsons family. "Rosse" refers to New Ross in County Wexford. History The Parsons were originally an English family from Dishworth ( Disewor ...

and TD Cooke. The latter sold his collection of Irish antiquities to the British Museum in 1854.

Description

One of the largest

assemblage of artefacts ever found in

, the Dowris Hoard originally comprised more than 200 pieces, of which 111 are currently in the collections of the National Museum of Ireland and 79 in the British Museum. In total, the hoard includes: *44 spearheads *48 crotals (a musical instrument in the form of a rattle) *43 socketed

axe An axe ( sometimes ax in American English; see spelling differences) is an implement that has been used for millennia to shape, split and cut wood, to harvest timber, as a weapon, and as a ceremonial or heraldic symbol. The axe has ma ...

s *26 bronze horns or trumpets *5 swords (approx 48 cm long, possibly originating from the south of England) *A riveted bronze

cauldron A cauldron (or caldron) is a large pot ( kettle) for cooking or boiling over an open fire, with a lid and frequently with an arc-shaped hanger and/or integral handles or feet. There is a rich history of cauldron lore in religion, mythology, and ...

*Three buckets or situlae *Numerous tools including chisels and knives. The hoard contains all but two of the Bronze Age crotals (Greek 'crotalon' – castanet or rattle) ever found, the other two also being Irish (but see also

crotal bell Crotal bells (Greek 'crotalon' – castanet or rattle) are various types of small bells or rattles. They were produced in various pre-Columbian cultures. In Europe they were made from probably before the early Middle Ages and though many founders ...

for later types). These are bronze cylinders in the rough shape of a bull's testicle, with a piece of baked clay or a pebble inside. It is presumed they functioned as a type of rattle, perhaps "in the rites of a fertility cult associated with the bull, echoes of which may survive in the early medieval tale ''

Táin Bó Cúailnge (Modern ; "the driving-off of the cows of Cooley"), commonly known as ''The Táin'' or less commonly as ''The Cattle Raid of Cooley'', is an epic from Irish mythology. It is often called "The Irish Iliad", although like most other early Iri ...

'' (''The Cattle Raid of Cooley'')". The hoard had 48 of them in total, in two sizes.Wallace, 86–93, 91 quoted

Notes

References

*G. Eogan: ''The Hoards of the Irish later Bronze Age''. Dublin, 1983; pp. 69–73. *Wallace, Patrick F., O'Floinn, Raghnall, eds. ''Treasures of the National Museum of Ireland: Irish Antiquities'', Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 2003 {{ISBN, 0717128296 Prehistoric Ireland Prehistoric objects in the British Museum Treasure troves in the Republic of Ireland Bronze Age art Collection of the National Museum of Ireland Ancient art in metal

Discovery

Description

See also

Notes

References