Antiquaries of Scotland, shown in Fig. 52a. It is made of green quartz and has the edge intentionally blunted. A smaller celt (712 inches) was found at Cunzierton near Jedburgh[1]; another (8 inches) at Rattray,[2] Perthshire; another (814 inches), only 34 inch thick at most, near Glenluce,[3] Wigtownshire; and others (8 inches) at Aberfeldy[4], Perthshire, and Dunfermline.[5]
Several of these highly polished jadeite celts have been found in dolmens in Brittany, and there are some fine specimens in the museum at Vannes. Some of them[6] have small holes bored through them. The various types of Brittany celts have been classified by the Société Polymathique du Morbihan.[7] In the Musée de St. Germain is a specimen (unbored) 9 inches long, found near Paris,[8] as also a hoard of fifteen, originally seventeen, mostly of jadeite and fibrolite, some perforated, found at Bernon,[9] near Arzon, Morbihan, in 1893. I have one 712 inches long from St. Jean, Châteaudun, and others 538 to 7 inches in length, of beautiful varieties of jade-like stone, found at Eu (Seine Inférieure), Miannay, near Abbeville (Somme), and Breteuil (Oise). The two latter are rounded and not sharp at the sides. One about 612 inches long, from the environs of Soissons, is in the museum at Lyons.
One of jade, of analogous form to these, and found near Brussels, is engraved by Le Hon.[10] Another was found at Maffles.[11]
Five specimens of the same character, of different sizes, the longest about 912 inches in length, and the shortest about 4 inches, are said to have been found with Roman remains at Kästrich, near Gonsenheim,[12] and are preserved in the museum at Mainz. The smallest is of greenstone, and the others of chloritic albite. They are said to have been buried in a sort of leather case, arranged alternately with the pointed and broad ends downwards, and in accordance with their size.
Eight specimens from museums at Weimar, Rudolstadt, and Leipzig were exhibited at Berlin[13] in 1880. One from Wesseling,[14] on the Rhine (8 inches), is thought to have been associated with Roman remains.
Both with the English and Continental specimens, there appears to be considerable doubt as to the exact localities whence the materials were derived from which these celts are formed.
Instruments for which such beautiful and intractable materials were selected, can hardly have been in common use; but we have not sufficient ground for arriving at any trustworthy conclusion as to the purpose for which they were intended. I have, however, a short celt, 312 inches long, from Bur well Fen, and made of this jade-like material, which has evidently been much in use, and was once considerably longer. It appears, indeed, to be the butt-end of an instrument like Fig. 52.
A detailed account of the jade and jadeite celts in the British Museum is given in the Zeitschrift für Ethnologie.[15]
- ↑ P. S. A. S., vol. xvii. p. 382; xxviii. p. 329.
- ↑ Op. cit., vol. x. p. 600; xvii. p. 383.
- ↑ Op. cit., vol. ix. p. 346; xvii. p. 384.
- ↑ Op. cit., vol. xxiii. p. 272.
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ Bonstetten, "Supp. au Rec. d'Ant. Suisses," pl. ii. 1.
- ↑ Proc. Ethnol. Soc., 1870, p. cxxxvii.
- ↑ Mortillet, "Promenades," p. 145; "Mus. Préh.," No. 459.
- ↑ See the account of the discovery, Rev. Arch., 3rd S., vol. xxiv. (1894), p. 260.
- ↑ "L'homme Fossile," 2nd Ed., p. 147.
- ↑ Van Overloop, Pl. ix. and x.
- ↑ Lindenschmit, "Alt. u. H. V.," vol. i., Heft. vol. ii., Taf. i. 19, &c.
- ↑ Voss. "Phot. Album," vol. vi., sec. vi.
- ↑ Jahrb. d. V. v. Alt. im Rh., L. p. 290.
- ↑ xix. p. 119. See also, for the origin of Jade, Fischer's "Jadeit und Nephrit," Westropp in Journ. Anth. Inst., vol. x. p. 359, and Rudler in Brit. Assoc. Rep., 1890, p. 971.
