The Bronze Age is a historic period, approximately 3300 BC to 1200 BC, that was characterized by the use of bronze, in some areas writing, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second principal period of the three-age system, as proposed in 1836 by Christian Jürgensen Thomsen, for classifying and studying ancient societies and history.
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly applied to Iron Age Europe and the Ancient Near East, but also, by analogy, to other parts of the Old World.
A hoard or "wealth deposit" is an archaeological term for a collection of valuable objects or artifacts, sometimes purposely buried in the ground, in which case it is sometimes also known as a cache. This would usually be with the intention of later recovery by the hoarder; hoarders sometimes died or were unable to return for other reasons before retrieving the hoard, and these surviving hoards might then be uncovered much later by metal detector hobbyists, members of the public, and archaeologists.
A lock ring, also spelled lock-ring, is a late Bronze Age penannular hair ornament. Typically made in gold, the intricate, decorative jewellery is recognized for its highly skilled workmanship. The name is derived from its suggested use as a hair fastener. Lock rings most likely originated in Ireland in the mid-eighth century B.C. They continued to be manufactured in Ireland, primarily in the River Shannon area into the seventh century B.C. Lock rings from the late Bronze Age have also been found in Great Britain and France.
Lost-wax casting is the process by which a duplicate metal sculpture is cast from an original sculpture. Intricate works can be achieved by this method.
The Ewart Park Phase is a period of the later Bronze Age Britain.
Bronze Age swords appeared from around the 17th century BC, in the Black Sea region and the Aegean, as a further development of the dagger. They were replaced by iron swords during the early part of the 1st millennium BC.
The Qijia culture was an early Bronze Age culture distributed around the upper Yellow River region of Gansu and eastern Qinghai, China. It is regarded as one of the earliest bronze cultures in China.
The Hoxne Hoard is the largest hoard of late Roman silver and gold discovered in Britain, and the largest collection of gold and silver coins of the fourth and fifth centuries found anywhere within the Roman Empire. It was found by Eric Lawes, a metal detectorist in the village of Hoxne in Suffolk, England in 1992. The hoard consists of 14,865 Roman gold, silver, and bronze coins and approximately 200 items of silver tableware and gold jewellery. The objects are now in the British Museum in London, where the most important pieces and a selection of the rest are on permanent display. In 1993, the Treasure Valuation Committee valued the hoard at £1.75 million.
The Atlantic Bronze Age is a cultural complex of the Bronze Age period in Prehistoric Europe of approximately 1300–700 BC that includes different cultures in Britain, France, Ireland, Portugal, and Spain.
The prehistory of Ireland has been pieced together from archaeological evidence, which has grown at an increasing rate over the last decades. It begins with the first evidence of permanent human residence in Ireland around 10,500 BC and finishes with the start of the historical record around 400 AD. Both the beginning and end dates of the period are later than for much of Europe and all of the Near East. The prehistoric period covers the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age societies of Ireland. For much of Europe, the historical record begins when the Romans invaded; as Ireland was not invaded by the Romans its historical record starts later, with the coming of Christianity.
The Isleham Hoard is a hoard of more than 6,500 pieces of worked and unworked bronze, dating from the Bronze Age, found in 1959 by William 'Bill' Houghton and his brother, Arthur, at Isleham, near Ely, in the English county of Cambridgeshire.
Bronze Age Britain is an era of British history that spanned from c. 2500–2000 BCE until c. 800 BCE. Lasting for approximately 1,700 years, it was preceded by the era of Neolithic Britain and was in turn followed by the period of Iron Age Britain. Being categorised as the Bronze Age, it was marked by the use of copper and then bronze by the prehistoric Britons, who used such metals to fashion tools. Great Britain in the Bronze Age also saw the widespread adoption of agriculture.
Nonferrous archaeometallurgy in the southern Levant is the archaeological study of non-iron-related metal technology in the region of the Southern Levant during the Chalcolithic period and Bronze Age from approximately 4500BC to 1000BC.
The Dowris Hoard is the name of an important Bronze Age hoard of over 200 objects found in Dowris, County Offaly, Ireland. Items from the deposit are currently split between two institutions: the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin and the British Museum in London.
The Havering hoard is a hoard of 453 late Bronze-age artefacts found at a site overlooking the River Thames in Rainham, London, in 2018. It is the largest bronze-age hoard to be found in London and the third-largest in the United Kingdom. The discovery was made during an archaeological investigation of the site prior to its use for gravel extraction. The finds included weapons, tools and ingots, but only a small quantity of jewellery. It was unusual in being buried in four separate locations; most bronze-age hoards previously excavated have been concentrated in a single location. Some of the items are from continental Europe, demonstrating links with that region. Several proposals have been put forward for the origin of the hoard, which include a collection of goods for recycling, an attempt by a single individual to control the bronze trade in the area or the large-scale abandonment of bronze goods at the start of the Iron Age. The artefacts are currently on exhibition at the Museum of London Docklands, after which they will be on display at the Havering Museum.
