Some of the finest examples of jet necklaces have been found with Bronze Age burials in Scotland, as at Balcalk, Forfarshire; Tayfield, Fife; Torrish, Sutherlandshire;[69] Assynt, Ross-shire;[70] Melfort, and Argyllshire. They have also been found occasionally in England, as at Middleton Moor,[71] Derbyshire. The beads of which the necklaces are composed are of three different shapes, ovoid, flat triangular plates, and four-sided flat plates. The flat beads are decorated with chevrons, triangles, and lozenges produced by rows of dots. Here again we have an instance of a kind of decoration which survived in Christian times. The last class of remains exhibiting Bronze Age decoration are the sculptured rocks and stones. Some of the carvings are found on natural rock surfaces and boulders; others on such megalithic monuments as stone circles, dolmens, and chambered cairns; whilst numerous examples are on the slabs forming the covers or sides of sepulchral cists. [69] Dr. J. Anderson’s _Scotland in Pagan Times: Bronze and Stone Ages_, pp. 53, 55, and 56. [70] Daniel Wilson’s _Prehistoric Annals of Scotland_. [71] Bateman’s _Ten Years’ Diggings_, p. 25. Although the megalithic structures called by the late Mr. James Ferguson “rude stone monuments” undoubtedly belong as a class to the Neolithic period, yet some of them exhibit decorative forms which are characteristic of the Bronze Age. This suggests the interesting speculation whether the ornamental patterns used by the Celts in the Bronze Age may not have been to a large extent borrowed from the Neolithic aborigines, and also whether the absorption of the Iberian peoples by the conquering Goidels may not have had a stimulating effect on decorative art. However this may be, it is a curious fact that the best specimens of Bronze Age ornament sculptured on stone exist in the Co. Meath, in Ireland, where such an admixture of race would be most likely to occur, and the type of monument on which the carvings are found belongs to the Neolithic period. In Ireland, therefore, either the erection of dolmens, chambered cairns, and other similar structures must have survived during the Bronze Age, or else the characteristic patterns of the Bronze Age must have been derived from a Neolithic source. The wonderful series of chambered cairns at Newgrange, near Drogheda, and at Sliabh na Calliaghe, near Oldcastle, both in the Co. Meath, have been well known to archæologists for many years, but it is only quite recently that their decorative sculpture has been studied scientifically by Mr. George Coffey, M.R.I.A., the Curator of the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy in Dublin. The following account has been compiled chiefly from Mr. Coffey’s admirable monographs on the subject, published in the _Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy_.[72] [72] Vol. xxx., p. 1.