More Celtic Gold

Hollow gold balls. Late Bronze Age, Ireland. Graduated sizes and with holes suggest that these balls could have been strung together to form a necklace.

An Amber necklace and a gold dress fastener. 800-700 BC. Ireland. 

Metropolitan Museum of Art, Treasures of Early Irish Art 1500 B.C. - 1500 A.D. New York.

The Derrinboy armlets are a pair of magnificent gold bracelets that were found deep within a County Offaly bog in 1959. Dating from the Late Bronze Age, these precious artifacts formed part of a small hoard of objects that were discovered by Mr. Patrick McGovern as he was digging turf. 

 They are decorated with raised ribs of alternately plain and patterned repoussé work.  They come from what is termed as the Bishopsland Phase.  The repoussé technique involved hammering a design onto a piece from the back.

Celtic Hammered Gold Bracelet

Gold Bulla

Found in the Bog of Allen, Co. Kildare and dates to about 700 B. C. it can be seen in the National Museum of Ireland. These were enigmatic objects of lead covered in gold foil decorated with repoussé designs of concentric circles, semi-circles, triangles and other patterns.  It is believed they may have served as an amulet or an object to ward off evil or ensure fertility.

 

These gold lock-rings come from the Dowris phase of the Late Bronze Age and date to circa 800 - 600  B. C.  They have a diameter of 10 cm. and length of 5 cm. with an internal width of 1.35 cm.  They were found in Gorteenreagh, County Clare in 1948 and are now on view at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin.

These gapped conical ornaments, thought to have been used for holding hair in place, such as at the end of a plait, demonstrate the highest skill of the early Irish goldsmith.

Ancient Golden Earring Discovered Hidden in a Jar in Israel

The assortment of jewelry is also out of the ordinary, notes Arie. Though the collection includes a number of lunette (moon-shaped) earrings of common Canaanite origin, researchers found an abundance of gold items in the collection and a number of beads made from carnelian, which was frequently used in the making of Egyptian jewellery in the same period.

This beautiful golden earring, decorated with figures of goats, was one of a trove of jewelry pieces that were wrapped in cloth and stuffed into a jar discovered by archaeologists at the Tel Meggido dig in Israel. When the team flushed the jar’s interior with water, earrings, a ring, and carnelian beads came tumbling out.

They aren’t sure why the jewelry was in the jar, but they posit that it could have been hidden there by the inhabitants of the home where the jar was found for safekeeping. The layer of soil where the find occurred dates from the 11th century BCE, a period when Meggido was under Egyptian rule, and the team believes the jewelry is either of Egyptian origin or inspired by Egyptian designs.



Image courtesy of American Friends of Tel Aviv University


Reposted from Discover Magazine