The Keshcarrigan Bowl is an Iron Age bronze bowl discovered to the north of Keshcarrigan, County Leitrim, Ireland, in the 19th century. The bowl was found in the waterway between Lough Scur and Lough Marrave ("lake of death"). [1] It was perhaps a ceremonial drinking cup. [2] The bowl would have been a prestigious item in 1st century Ireland, the bird-shaped handle outstandingly designed and skillfully executed. [3] [4] The Keshcarrigan Bowl is in the archaeology branch of the National Museum of Ireland. [5]
The Keshcarrigan bowl is considered one of the finest classic cast bronze cups, or drinking vessel. Made of bright-yellow metal, it was discovered c. 1842 – c. 1850 during the building of the "Ulster Canal". [1] [2] [6] The bowl is a fine golden bronze only 14 centimetres (5.5 in) wide and 1 millimetre (0.039 in) in thickness, being cast or beaten into shape before being finished and polished by being spun on a lathe. [5] [7] [8] The neck was finished off against an internal mould. [5] The principal decorative feature of the bowl is its cast bronze zoomorphic handle, following the graceful shape of a bird-beast head of a somewhat nondescript appearance influenced by the flamboyant ornamentation of its time, soldered to the body of the vessel at the base and loosely connected to the vessel neck. [5] [9] The ridge at the front of the bird-head, the 'shield' below, and impression of a beak turning-backward, are all characteristic of the male-Shelduck. [10]
In 2018 it was shown on an Irish postage stamp, after featuring in A History of Ireland in 100 Objects . [11]
The brilliantly modeled ducks-head handle on the Keshcarrigan bowl is an early masterpiece of the style, comparable to the best British work of the period such as the bird-finials on the Torrs Chamfrein horns, [3] the stylistic identity of both heads representing ducks, and both having empty slots for studs in the eyes. [12] The Torrs style originated in Britain in the middle or second half of the third century BC. The Keshcarrigan cup is on stylistic grounds likely to be contemporary with the Torrs pieces, with the "crimped" pattern on the rim of the Keshcarrigan bowl perhaps comparable with similar techniques used on the circular Wandsworth boss and the terminal circular insignias on the Witham Shield. The bowl seems to have close affinities to pottery bowls of identical profile from Brittany, which have a similar "crimped" pattern on their inner rims. Being lathe-spun the age of the bowl suggests a comparatively late date at variance with the stylistic evidence. The bowl is of importance in showing the Torrs style is recorded in both Britain and Ireland. [13] The cup resembles another found at Fore, County Westmeath, which is slightly earlier and imported from Britain, as this may also be. [14]
The bowl was intended for drinking purposes, for eating food out of, as a container, and ceremonial purposes. [2] [3] [9] Metal handled cups are a feature of late La Tène culture, and their production might have been stimulated by the re-appearance of wine-services imported from the Classical world. [15] [n 1]
Some sources suggest the bowl was imported across the Irish Sea because the practice of producing bronze bowls using a spinning technique was done in the Belgae workshops of south-east England, and Roman continental workshops, rather than Ireland. [7] [16] However the evidence for this conclusion is conjecture, and the Keshcarrigan bowl was just as likely made in Ireland. [17] A reasonably close parallel to the Keshcarrigan cup is a handled vessel of willow, presumably Irish origin, in the National Museum of Ireland, and another bronze handle from a similar profile cup was discovered at County Galway. [17] Conversely, though a similar handle was recently found in the Somerset hoard, [7] no other vessel of this style was found in southern Britain, [15] so the practice of making bowls with ornamental bird handles must have become established in Ireland sometime in the early 1st century AD. [18]
O'Toole suggested the Keshcarrigan Bowl represents evidence for the movement of people into Ireland following upheavals in Celtic Europe in the century before and after the birth of Christ. Gallic Belgic tribes crossed into Britain as refugees from the Romans and displacing native people some of whom came to Ireland. [19]
Grooved ware is the name given to a pottery style of the British Neolithic. Its manufacturers are sometimes known as the Grooved ware people. Unlike the later Beaker ware, Grooved culture was not an import from the continent but seems to have developed in Orkney, early in the 3rd millennium BC, and was soon adopted in Britain and Ireland.
A bowl is a typically round dish or container generally used for preparing, serving, or consuming food. The interior of a bowl is characteristically shaped like a spherical cap, with the edges and the bottom forming a seamless curve. This makes bowls especially suited for holding liquids and loose food, as the contents of the bowl are naturally concentrated in its center by the force of gravity. The exterior of a bowl is most often round, but can be of any shape, including rectangular.
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.
Food vessels are an Early Bronze Age, c. 2400-1500 BC, pottery type. It is not known what food vessels were used for and they only received their name as antiquarians decided they were not beakers and so it provided a good contrast. Recently, the concept of the food vessels was questioned by many archaeologists in favour of a concept of two different traditions: the bowl tradition and the vase tradition. Vases are tall vessels with their height being greater than their largest diameter, while bowls are short vessels with their height being less than or equal to their greatest diameter.
The Rudge Cup is a small enamelled bronze cup found in 1725 at Rudge, near Froxfield, in Wiltshire, England. The cup was found down a well on the site of a Roman villa. It is important in that it lists five of the forts on the western section of Hadrian's Wall, thus aiding scholars in identifying the forts correctly. The information on the cup has been compared with the two major sources of information regarding forts on the Wall, the Notitia Dignitatum and the Ravenna Cosmography.
The National Museum of Ireland – Archaeology is a branch of the National Museum of Ireland located on Kildare Street in Dublin, Ireland, that specialises in Irish and other antiquities dating from the Stone Age to the Late Middle Ages.
The Torrs Horns and Torrs Pony-cap are Iron Age bronze pieces now in the National Museum of Scotland, which were found together, but whose relationship is one of many questions about these "famous and controversial" objects that continue to be debated by scholars. Most scholars agree that horns were added to the pony-cap at a later date, but whether they were originally made for this purpose is unclear; one theory sees them as mounts for drinking-horns, either totally or initially unconnected to the cap. The three pieces are decorated in a late stage of La Tène style, as Iron Age Celtic art is called by archaeologists. The dates ascribed to the elements vary, but are typically around 200 BC; it is generally agreed that the horns are somewhat later than the cap, and in a rather different style.
Carrigallen is a barony in County Leitrim, Ireland.
Lough Scur is a freshwater lake in south County Leitrim, northwest Ireland. It is part of the Shannon–Erne Waterway. There have been Human settlements here since the New Stone Age. Modern features include quays and moorings. Protected features are Castle John, three Crannogs, and the causeway into Rusheen Island, though "Jail Island" is not protected. The ecology of Lough Scur, and indeed all county Leitrim lakes, is threatened by pollution and invasive species such as curly waterweed, zebra mussel, and freshwater clam.
Castlefore Lough is a mesotrophic freshwater in northwest Ireland. Known for good coarse fishing, Castlefore Lough has limited bank fishing. The ecology of Castlefore Lough, and other Leitrim waterways, is threatened by curly waterweed, zebra mussel, and freshwater clam invasive species.
Lough Marrave is a small freshwater lake in county Leitrim in the northwest of Ireland.
Drumaleague Lough is a very small freshwater in northwest Ireland. The ecology of Drumaleague Lough, and other Leitrim waterways, remain threatened by zebra mussel and other invasive species.
The Benty Grange hanging bowl is a fragmentary Anglo-Saxon artefact from the seventh century AD. All that remains are two escutcheons: bronze frames that are usually circular and elaborately decorated, and that sit outside the rim or at the interior base of a hanging bowl. A third disintegrated soon after excavation, and no longer survives. The escutcheons were found in 1848 by the antiquary Thomas Bateman, while excavating a tumulus at the Benty Grange farm in western Derbyshire, and were undoubtedly buried as part of an entire hanging bowl. The grave had probably been looted by the time of Bateman's excavation, but still contained high-status objects suggestive of a richly furnished burial, including the hanging bowl and the Benty Grange helmet.
The Soiscél Molaisse is an Irish cumdach that originated from an 8th-century wooden core embellished in the 11th and 15th centuries with metal plates decorated in the Insular style. Until the late 18th century, the shrine held a now-lost companion text, presumed to be a small illuminated gospel book associated with Saint Laisrén mac Nad Froích, also known as Molaisse or "Mo Laisse". In the 6th century, Molaisse founded a church on Devenish Island in the southern part of Lough Erne in County Fermanagh, with which the cumdach is associated.
House-shaped shrine are early medieval portable metal reliquary formed in the shape of the roof of a rectangular building. They originate from both Ireland and Scotland and mostly date from the 8th or 9th centuries. Typical example consist of a wooden core covered with silver and copper alloy plates, and were built to hold relics of saints or martyrs from the early Church era; a number held corporeal remains when found in the modern period, presumably they were parts of the saint's body. Others, including the Breac Maodhóg, held manuscripts associated with the commemorated saint. Like many Insular shrines, they were heavily reworked and embellished in the centuries following their initial construction, often with metal adornments or figures influenced by Romanesque sculpture.
The Gleninsheen gorget is a late Bronze Age collar, found in 1930 in the Gleninsheen region of the Burren, County Clare, Ireland. Given that the gorget is made from gold and weighs 276 g (8.9 ozt) it must have been intended as an ornament for a high-ranking warrior. Dated to c. 800–700 BC, it is one of the earliest examples of substantial Irish goldwork, although the gorget may represent a development of the much earlier, and lighter, gold lunula form. Both are mainly found in Ireland.
The Rinnegan Crucifixion Plaque is a late 7th or early 8th century Irish gilt-bronze crucifixion plaque sculpture found in the 19th century in the churchyard of St. John’s on the head of Lough Ree in Rinnegan County Westmeath, and near Athlone, County Roscommon. It is one of the earliest extant representations of the crucifixion in Irish art, and outside of illuminated manuscripts, a rare example of both representation and a narrative scene in early Irish Insular art.
The Moylough Belt-Shrine is a highly decorated 8th-century Irish reliquary shaped in the form of a belt. It consists of four hinged bronze segments, each forming cavities that hold strips of plain leather assumed to have once been a girdle belonging to a saint and thus the intended relic. It remains the only known relic container created as a belt-shrine, although such objects are mentioned in some lives of Irish saints, where they are attributed with "remarkable cures", and there are surviving reliquary buckles in continental Europe. The belt may have been influenced by 7th-century Frankish and Burgundian types.
Crucifixion plaques are small early medieval sculptures with a central panel of the still alive but crucified Jesus surrounded by four smaller ancillary panels. consisting. of Stephaton and Longinus in the lower quadrants, and two hovering attendant angels in the quadrants above his arms. Notable examples are found in classical Roman and 8th to mid-12th century Irish Insular art.