I love Celtic, I do not quibble over the word as so many intellectuals do, I welcome the artistic heritage that goes into the beautiful curvilinear design of their work, only perhaps picked up in the 1920's in the Arts and Craft movement.
The above is a shield found in a 'square barrow' of the Parisi tribe who in the Iron Age lived in East Yorkshire. Their barrows with body, chariot and horses are found in their cemeteries, the above shield comes from Pocklington. The body is dated somewhere between 320 bc to 174 bc, which is rather a long dating sequence. The ponies found in the grave were deliberately displayed as almost leaping out of the grave, a reminder that there is another world to be entered and their owner has only seen a temporary residence in this world and now go on to better things. Groaning food tables, beautiful women (gosh have I not seen this elsewhere?).
The newspaper article says it is 'the most important ancient find this millennium' and perhaps it is but such work continued through the century, and by the way, was not the product of this country but came from the Europe we are now departing.
Here is something similar, the pony was after all the 'Ferrari' of the Iron Age, it is a copy of course, but also needed protection from the constant war faring.
I get quite excited by such work, lying in the earth for hundreds of years, they reveal on their discovery a world that was equal to our own and are a humbling experience. And how the belief in another world was so embedded, look at a much later Saxon burial at Loftus, the lady buried in a bed with her jewellery.
Parisi wiki entry: Burials in East Yorkshire dating from the pre-Roman Iron Age are distinguished as those of the Arras Culture,[ and show differences from surrounding areas, generally lacking grave goods, but chariot burials and burials with swords are known but are similar (chariot burials) to those ascribed to the La Tène culture of areas of western and central Europe, giving a potential link to the similarly named Parisii of Gaul
Beautiful horse armor. A time so long ago that it seems like a fantasy story.
ReplyDeleteIn a way it is, after all what remains are the hardware, whether jewellery or weapons.
DeleteI am happy with the term Celtic too. A fabulous shield - I can remember being told that the craftsmanship and design of Celtic La Tene pieces was never even matched, let alone surpassed, until the Arts and Crafts movement of the late 1800s.
ReplyDeleteInterested to see that three ring type snaffle - was it based on the one actually found? I imagine it was, and as such is unusual.
Never looked into Iron age bridles, it seems a bit cumbersome, three snaffle rings on either side. I love the delicate Celtic mirrors, etched on one side and polished on the other.
DeleteCheekpiece (leading to headpiece) on top ring, and two others allow an option for more leverage putting the rein on the lower one if required. The metal cheek of the bit stops it being pulled through the mouth when cornering at speed, for one thing, but generally helps turn a (recalcitrant) pony too. I've been thinking about how they propped up the rearing ponies in the burial, and think the harnesswould have held them upright to a degree, and if you put a pole across under their forelegs (with them in the rearing position) they would stay that way when buried. Ditto one under the throats of the ponies too. Just an idea anyway.
DeleteThough the Pocklington finds are fabulous, I never feel entirely comfortable about digging up graves - be they Iron Age, Egyptian or whatever. Despite the archaeology it all seems like sacrilege to me. I hope they don't go digging up my grandparents in the next few years.
ReplyDeleteWell because of the enormous amount of people needing to be buried, I think many a Victorian grave yard has been dug over. There is of course a code of conduct by the archaeologidt on old bones but I am not sure what it is.
ReplyDeleteI love Celtic too!
ReplyDeleteThank you for all the generous information you give us, here!!!!
🎄 🎄 🎄 🎄
Strangely enough it has started a new thread of interest for me.
DeleteThank you for this post . The shield is very beautiful .
ReplyDeleteAnd thank you for visiting.
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