The Crotal
The Crotal is a cast and welded hollow bronze bell. About the size of a pear, most have a stone or piece of metal inside to create a rolling or rattling sound. Because they make this sound, experts think they are probably some kind of percussion instrument for ritual music-making – like an ancient maraca.
They’re also similar to traditional cow, horse and cat bells, but the effort and skill used to make these Bronze Age artefacts, and the nature of their deposition in bogs suggests that crotals were much more than just functional. Bells are used across the world in ritual and religious ceremonies, and it’s quite possible that our ancestors used crotals in ritual practices too.
“Bronze Age people in Ireland certainly raised cattle, and it’s not hard to imagine that prized animals inspired these valuable bronze instruments”
Holy cows
The horns and crotals could be strong evidence indicating that Bronze Age people in Ireland had a society focused around cattle. Like pastoral, cattle-focused communities in modern East Africa, such as the Nuer and Dinka peoples of South Sudan and Ethiopia, cattle can be a functional source of milk and meat, wealth on-the-hoof, as well as treasured possessions with deep spiritual and ritual importance. Nuer people are so devoted to their cattle that men and women take a cow or bull’s name as well as their birth name, favourite cows will be groomed, stroked and sung to, and all important ceremonies will be marked by a cattle sacrifice. Bronze Age people in Ireland certainly raised cattle, and it’s not hard to imagine that prized animals inspired these valuable bronze instruments.
The horns look like cows’ horns simply enough, and it’s been pointed out that crotal bells are shaped like the testicles of a bull – a source of potency in many cultures. Even now, modern slang reveals the great legacy linking balls with power, strength, bravery and family lineage. It’s possible that the shape of the crotal was as important and as potent as the noise it made for its Bronze Age owners.
See also:
Pegsdon Mirror
Nesscliffe Ritual Spoons
Hallaton Treasure
Fort George Toy Soldiers
18th-century toys from a Highland fortress
Date: 1748–1768, Post Medieval
Where, when and how found: Fort George, Ardersier, Inverness; 2005 & 2006; metal detecting
Finder: Eric Soane
Where is it now: Held in collections at Inverness Museum
www.inverness.highland.museum
Visit: Fort George, Ardersier, Inverness
www.historic-scotland.gov.uk
Eric Soane was given a metal detector a decade ago, but it didn’t immediately grab his interest and it spent a few years languishing in his shed. Then he found some back issues of a metal detecting magazine in a charity shop, and his interest was fired. Once he started detecting, he didn’t look back – he’s now logged more than 20,000 finds from the Ardersier area with the Treasure Trove Unit in Scotland, as he’s required to do under Scottish law.
Eric found these cast-lead toy soldiers near Fort George, an enormous military base built by King George II to quash Jacobite Rebellions led by Bonnie Prince Charlie in the 1700s. It’s still a working army base, and is considered to be the best artillery fortification ever built in Britain.
Fort George
In 1746, Bonnie Prince Charlie was defeated by the forces of King George II at the Battle of Culloden. To prevent further rebellions, King George ordered the building of the biggest, most sophisticated defence fortress ever conceived. In today’s money, Fort George cost around £1 billion to build, and it took the best part of twenty years to complete.
It was built on a defendable promontory looking out into the Moray Firth, and was bristling with 80 guns and stores of 2,500 barrels of gunpowder, and staffed by officers, an artillery detachment and 1,600 infantry troops armed with swords and muskets. Before Fort George was completed, British soldiers camped at the site, ensuring the construction wasn’t attacked, and conducting regular patrols in the region. They were well-drilled, well-armed, and would have been an intimidating presence to the rebels.
Fort George was completed in 1769, well over-budget and well behind schedule, and by that time, the rebellious forces fighting against King George in the Highlands had been subdued. It meant a shot was never fired in anger from Fort George, and its defences have never been tested. Its true build quality is revealed by the fact that it’s still used as a working army barracks now, virtually unchanged.
Eighteenth-century life in the Highlands was hard, but clearly the soldiers known as ‘Red Coats’ had at least elements of domestic life and social time – enough to make toys and trinkets.
The Toy Soldiers
Around 3cm high, these two soldiers were found on separate occasions but are clearly from the same mould. The two halves of the mould are slightly misaligned, and the lead is probably from melted-down musket balls, which suggests that these little figures were made locally by non-specialists using materials they had to hand.
“Interestingly, soldiers’ coat skirts were always hooked back for parade or other duties, and left hanging in front when on campaign, so these soldiers look ready for action”
Each toy soldier is dressed in a knee-length coat with a flaring skirt, a cap, shoulder belt but no waist belt, and a musket over the left shoulder. Based on the style of coat, experts have been able to date the soldiers – waist belts were worn over the coat until 1748, and the skirted style of coat was worn by the soldiers until 1768, when it was replaced by a slightly differently tailored coat. So, by deduction, these soldiers date from between 1748 and 1768.
Interestingly, soldiers’ coat skirts were always hooked back for parade or other duties, and left hanging in front when on campaign, so these soldiers look ready for action.
For some, the building of Fort George was a threat, for others it was an opportunity. So many soldiers posted far from home needed servicing – and the local economies around Fort George and her sister fort at Fort William, boomed. Some soldiers may have had families living outside the fort but close by, a few families might have lived within the fort itself, and other soldiers inevitably found their company elsewhere, in the local community. We don’t know who the toy soldiers were made for, but it’s likely that men were crafting little toys and trinkets for the kids in their lives.
See also:
Pitminster Toy Cannon
Inverness Shoulder-belt Plate
Prisoner of War Farthing Pendant
Girona Wreck Cameo
A missing piece from an Armada tragedy
Date: Shipwrecked in 1588, Post Medieval
Where, when and how found: Wreck of La Girona, Lacada Point, County Antrim; 1998; chance find by an authorised diver
Finder: Frank Madden
Where is it now? Ulster Museum, Belfast
www.nmni.com
Also visit: The area of the Causeway Coast
www.causewaycoastandglens.com
Glenarm Castle, Ballymena, County Antrim
www.glenarmcastle.com
In the 1960s a team of commercial divers discovered the historic wreck of La Girona, close to the Giant’s Cause way off the coast of County Antrim, Northern Ireland. Among the wreckage, they found eleven 4cm high lapis lazuli cameos – oval pieces of jewellery with a profile portrait in the middle of an ornate frame. The portraits were of Roman emperors and the frames were solid gold, with enamelling and two strings of pearls threaded along each side.
The divers suspected there should have been twelve cameos, and that they would have been strung together to make a magnificent chain, a bit like a Town Mayor’s chain of office now.
The 1960s divers never found the twelfth cameo, despite a thorough search, although they did bring up many other staggering and precious treasures including rings, a tiny reliquary, pendants, weapons and hundreds of gold and silver coins. The fact that the wreck was giving up such precious treasures was not surprising, given the circumstances of her loss.
The wrecking of La Girona
La Girona was one of the ships of the Spanish Armada of 1588, a force of around 130 ships sent by Philip II of Spain to invade England. The Armada fleet was defeated at the naval Battle of Gravelines in the English Channel, but managed to get into formation and sail away. The surviving Spanish ships were forced into the North Sea, off the east coast of Britain, and it was decided that they should sail up over the top of the British Isles, down the west coast of Ireland and then continue south to get back to Spain. It was certainly the long way round, but infinitely safer than running the gauntlet back through the English Channel.
The navigators of the fleet didn’t have any of the benefits of modern, or even traditional, equipment to help fix their positions. They didn’t have chronometers or sextants and they didn’t even have accurate maps of the coastline. They were also unaware of the effect of the Gulf Stream current, so every time they estimated their position, they thought that they’d travelled much further than they actually had. Instead of passing to the north of the Shetland Islands, they passed between Orkney and Fair Isle, much closer to dangerous rocky shores than they realised. They miscalculated again when they started to move south along the west coast of Scotland and then around Ireland.
By this time, many of the ships were low on supplies and fresh water, many men were injured or sick, and the ships themselves were leaking and damaged – they’d lost masts, yard arms, sails and anchors, and repairs couldn’t be done unless they sailed closer to the coast to find sheltered waters. Added to that were weeks and weeks of poor visibility and gale-force conditions, that meant the fleet was sailing ‘blind’.
Most of the eighty-odd remaining ships kept west, didn’t stop to resupply, and managed to avoid the Irish coastline and make landfall on the Spanish coast – despite the cripplingly poor condition of the sailors and soldiers on board.
La Girona was one of the ships that decided to take refuge closer in to the Irish coast, so that her rudder could be repaired – the crew landed at Killybegs, where the locals were sympathetic and willingly provided supplies and stores. While La Girona was being repaired at Killybegs, a plan was made that she would take the surviving crews from two other wrecked Armada ships that had foundered nearby, sail everyone to Scotland to recuperate, before journeying back south to reach Spain. All in all, when she set off again, La Girona was laden down with thirteen hundred men, extra cannon, stores and supplies. She had been built to carry 550 people.
Soon afterwards, another fierce gale blew up. The rowers on board could make no headway and the sails were useless; the anchors were lost, and eventually the helpless, overloaded Girona was driven in total darkness on to the rocks of Lacada Point.
No one can be quite sure, but the local story is that only five people out of 1,300 survived the wreck on that stormy, ferocious night. La Girona was one of around twenty-five Armada ships wrecked on the west coast of Ireland in just a few days in October 1588, and she holds the dubious record for the greatest loss of life. Human bones washed on to the shore for years afterwards, and the local harbour still remembers the Girona shipwreck – it’s called Port na Spaniagh, ‘Spanish Port’.
Salvage of valuables from the wreck began almost immediately – bronze cannon were recovered, and one of the wooden chests at Glenarm Castle is from La Girona. It’s said that the pockets of the drowned sailors washed up ashore were also checked – any gold was good gold.
Most of the treasures of La Girona were lost under the waves, though, and were only retrieved when divers rediscovered the wreck in 1968. The incredible collection of Armada gold at the Ulster Museum, Belfast, is truly breathtaking. Although they unearthed so many treasures, the twelfth cameo in the set eluded the 1960s team.
The twelfth cameo
It was only in 1998, when the authorised diver Frank Madden was diving the Girona wreck, that he found a small, golden oval amongst the debris and mud – it was the near-legendary twelfth cameo. Incredibly, it was in excellent condition, despite the fact that it had been on the seabed for thirty years longer than the other eleven. We don’t know which of the emperors the lapis lazuli portrait represents, but it’s clear that it was part of the ornate chain that was probably worn by one of the leaders of the Armada on board La Girona.
La Girona is now a protected wreck, so taking anything from the site would be illegal. The dive community saying – leave nothing but bubbles, take nothing but pictures – holds especially true for this incredible, and tragic, site. Despite our appreciation of the beauty of the Girona gold and treasures, it can’t be forgotten that this is also a war grave.
See also:
HMS Colossus Shipwreck
Marcus Aurelius Bust
Carpow Bronze Age Logboat
An ancient oak boat resting in the River Tay for 3,000 years
Date: Around 1130–970BC, Late Bronze Age
Where, when and how found: River Tay, Carpow, Perth and Kinross; 2001; discovered on riverbed
Finders: Scott McGuckin, Robert Fotheringham, Martin Brookes
Where is it now? Part of the Museums Collection of Perth and Kinross Council, but the boat will be at Glasgow Museums Resource Centre from 2013 to 2018 for further research. Not on full public display – viewings by appointment, as well as a programme of public talks and events
www.glasgowlife.org.uk/museums/our-museums/glasgow-museum-resource-centre/
Also visit: Scottish Crannog Centre, Loch Tay, Perthshire
www.crannog.co.uk
Get involved: Perth and Kinross Heritage Trust outreach and community programme
www.pkht.org.uk
In 2000 and 2001, a number of people had noticed what looked like an old tree eroding out of the tidal riverbed at Carpow. Twice a day the ‘tree’ was covered by water, and each time the tide went out, a bit more of it was exposed. Local men Scott McGuckin, Robert Fotheringham and Martin Brookes each realised it wasn’t just a ‘tree’, but an ancient logboat. The incredible find was reported to local archaeologists and a team from Perth and Kinross Heritage Trust confirmed that it was indeed an ancient oak logboat – hollowed out from a single tree trunk around 3,000 years ago, dating to the late Bronze Age. They began to assess the site – to take the boat out of the riverbed could risk it breaking up, and conserving it out of the water would certainly be very expensive. If the logboat could be made safe in situ, then it could stay there – it had already survived more than 3,000 years.
The boat itself was incredibly well preserved and had survived to almost its full length of 9 metres. In 2006 the logboat was finally excavated; and with teams racing against the tide each day, they managed to record, sample, survey and lift the boat in seven days. Sediments from inside the boat revealed fragments of hazelnut shells and worked wood – the litter of a Bronze Age boatman. Once the logboat was clear of its muddy resting place, it was refloated and slowly paddled downriver to a place where it could safely be lifted out. Hundreds of local people came to watch the precarious but successful mission, and the boat was taken to the National Museums Scotland conservation lab near Edinburgh. The specialists couldn’t allow the logboat to dry out – if it did, the wood would shrink, crack and disintegrate. They carefully soaked the whole of the logboat in a chemical bath that replaced the water in the wood cells with Polyethylene glycol (a substance that’s also used in laxative treatments and experimental medicines for spinal injuries). The final step was to freeze-dry the remaining water out of the timber in an industrial freezer oven. The whole conservation process took more than five years, dozens of experts, and hundreds of thousands of pounds. When the Carpow Logboat was put on display in 2012 at the Perth Museum, more than 82,000 people came to see it.
Logboat technology
Building a picture from the tool marks in the wood of the Carpow Logboat, from tools that have been discovered, and from modern experimental archaeology, we can tell that making a logboat could involve a whole community – people used bronze axes to chop down a large, stra
ight mature oak tree, and then a series of specialised bronze woodworking tools to shape, hollow out and smooth the trunk into a canoe-shape. The bow (front) end was shaped to a point in the wood itself, and the stern (back) was sealed with a transom board – a flat vertical board snugly fitted into the log shape to make the end watertight. When it was completed, it would have been paddled along with wooden paddles, and been able to safely carry up to a tonne of cargo, or around fourteen people.
During the Bronze Age the Tayside area was mostly wooded, with fertile, well-draining pasture and fields cleared amongst the trees. People would have lived surrounded by their fields, animals and small workshop areas and enclosures, like a modern smallholding or croft. But the Carpow Logboat reveals that these smallholders were also capable sailors and decent fishermen.
It looks like the Carpow boat gave many good years of service to its builders – perhaps up to three decades – for fishing, hunting and ferrying people, livestock, grain and building material like timber and stone along the rivers and across the estuary. Larger, more stable plank boats were also being constructed in the Bronze Age to make journeys across the open sea – we know that Bronze Age people were well connected to each other up and down the British and Irish coasts, as well as with communities across the North Sea and into France, Spain and Portugal.
The bottom of the hull of the Carpow boat had a split that was repaired seven times with oil-saturated plant glue and moss caulking, and the transom had an additional board shaped and fitted, perhaps to help prevent water seeping in. Perhaps these splits and leaks eventually meant the boat was ‘retired’ from service and abandoned in the river, where it sat for 3,000 years. A treasure of national importance, spotted by eagle-eyed and passionate members of the public, and preserved for us all by a committed team of professionals.
Britain's Secret Treasures Page 26