Celtic art in Pagan and Christian times — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Celtic art in Pagan and Christian times
John Stuart Mill · en
Sometimes slabs of stone sculptured with cup-marks, cups and rings, and
spirals, have been found associated with Bronze Age burials, although
not forming parts of a cist. One of the most remarkable discoveries
of this kind was made at Old Parks,[86] near Kirk Oswald, Cumberland.
In 1894 a barrow composed of loose stones, 80 feet in diameter and 4
feet high, was opened by the late Chancellor R. S. Ferguson, F.S.A.,
and when the mound was removed a row of five slabs fixed upright in
the ground was disclosed. The stones were in a line pointing north
and south, cutting the site of the mound into two halves, and three
of them are sculptured with spirals. As many as thirty-two deposits
of burnt bones were found in holes scooped out of the natural surface
of the ground, together with two ornamented urns of incense-cup form,
fragments of several other urns, and a necklace of cannel-coal beads.
[84] _Ibid._, vol. vi., _Appendix_, p. 27.
[85] _Ibid._, vol. xxix., p. 190.
[86] _Cumb. and West. Ant. Soc. Trans._, vol. xiii., p. 389.
A slab of stone sculptured with spirals and concentric circles was
found in 1883 on Lilburn Hill[87] Farm near Wooler, Northumberland,
associated with seven deposits of burnt bones buried in small circular
pits.
Stones sculptured with cups, or cups and rings, have been found either
as cover-stones of urns or associated with burials in round barrows at
the following places:—
NORTHUMBERLAND. Ingoe.
Black Hedon.
Kirk Whelpington.
CUMBERLAND. Maughanby.
YORKSHIRE. Kilburn.
Ayton Moor.
Claughton Moor.
Wykeham Moor.
DERBYSHIRE. Elkstone.
Sheen.
STAFFORDSHIRE. Stanton.
DORSETSHIRE. Came Down.
SUTHERLANDSHIRE. Dornoch Links.
ABERDEENSHIRE. Greenloan, Cabrach.
A link between the art of the Bronze Age in Britain and the art of
Mycenæ is afforded by a rock-sculpture at Ilkley,[88] Yorkshire, which
takes the form of a curved swastika. It belongs to a peculiar class of
patterns composed of winding bands and small bosses or dots, of which
there are numerous examples in the Scandinavian[89] and Mycenæan[90]
metalwork. Perhaps some of the Late-Celtic designs, in which the
arrangement of the long sweeping =S-= and =C-=shaped curves is governed
by the position of circular bosses they connect, may be descended
from the winding-band patterns of the Mycenæan period. For instance,
the designs on the enamelled handles of the bowl found at Barlaston,
Staffordshire, and on the Ilkley rock-sculpture have obvious points in
common, both being founded on the curved swastika.
[87] _Archæol. Æliana_, ser. 2, vol. x., p. 220.
[88] _Jour. Brit. Archæol. Assoc._, vol. xxxv., p. 18.
[89] A. P. Madsen’s _Antiquités préhistoriques du Danemark_.
[90] Schlieman’s _Mycenæ_, pp. 166, 167, 169, 264, and 265.