Only three sculptured monuments decorated with Late-Celtic patterns are known to exist at present.[263] They are all in Ireland and are fully described by Mr. G. Coffey in the _Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy_ (vol. xxiv., sect. c, p. 257). [263] At Mullaghmast, Co. Kildare; Castle Strange, Co. Roscommon; and Turoe, Co. Galway. [Illustration: GRANITE MONOLITH, WITH LATE-CELTIC SCULPTURE, AT TUROE, CO. GALWAY. HEIGHT OF STONE, 4 FT. _Reproduced from a photograph by Mr. A. McGoogan illustrating Mr. George Coffey’s paper in the “Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy”_] CHAPTER V PAGAN CELTIC ART IN THE EARLY IRON AGE TECHNICAL PROCESSES EMPLOYED DURING THE EARLY IRON AGE IN BRITAIN The fact must never be lost sight of that the picture presented to our mind of any particular prehistoric stage of culture must necessarily be extremely imperfect, since the extent of our knowledge is limited entirely by the number of relics which specially favourable circumstances have preserved from destruction. Of the textile fabrics of the Late-Celtic period, for instance, hardly anything is known, although we are certain that spinning and weaving must have been extensively practised from the quantities of long-handled weaving-combs, spindle-whorls, and loom-weights that have been found on almost every inhabited site. A people who showed such a high capacity for decorative design could not have failed to produce good artistic effects by means of pattern-weaving.[264] What such textile patterns may have been can only be guessed at by survivals (like the Scottish tartans) or by ornament of a textile character occurring on objects made of less perishable materials (like the step-pattern on a piece of wood from the Glastonbury Marsh Village). [264] “The cloth was covered with an infinite number of little squares and lines as if it had been sprinkled with flowers, or was striped with crossing bars which formed a chequered design. Their favourite colour was red or a pretty crimson.” C. Elton’s _Origins of English History_, p. 114, quoting Pliny and Diodorus Siculus. The Celts had already become expert workers in metal before the close of the Bronze Age; they could make beautiful hollow castings for the chapes of their sword-sheaths; they could beat out bronze into thin plates and rivet them together sufficiently well to form water-tight caldrons; they could ornament their circular bronze shields and golden diadems with repoussé patterns, consisting of corrugations and rows of raised bosses; and they were not unacquainted with the art of engraving on metal. The Celt of the Early Iron Age attained to a still higher proficiency in metallurgy than his predecessor of the Bronze Age. Casting in bronze was applied to a much larger number of objects than before, such as—