Javelin with loop.
remains of the stick were found in one of them; a very perfect small dagger of bronze, one foot in length; two bronze arrow-heads, double pointed[1]; a bronze gouge or chisel, rarely found in Ireland; the head of a bronze hunting spear; part of a bronze sword or dagger; a bronze cap, apparently the end of a wooden hilt of some weapons; the bronze handle of a javelin or spear, with loop attached, for the purpose of a leathern thong or string being fastened to it, to recover after projection. [This thong or string is called in ancient manuscripts suaineamain, a name still preserved by the fishermen in the south of Ireland, as applied to the bolt-ropes of their nets.] The boss of a shield, of bronze; a bronze knife, which appears to have been gilt; a bronze knife or dagger, measuring ten inches and a half in length; a smaller one, seven inches in length; a bronze bolt, with loop, to which a thong is supposed to have been attached, measuring sixteen inches and a half in length; this was found sticking in the mud, close to the island on Lough na Glack; another, twelve inches in length, has been since found in the island itself. Walker, in his description of the weapons of the Irish, says that "in very early times the fiadhgha or crannuibh was used in the chase, a thong was affixed to it, by which it was recovered after having pierced the wild beast[2]."
- ↑ Sir Samuel R. Meyrick, to whom a sketch of one of these bifid heads was submitted, remarks in a letter to Mr. Way, "The bronze arrow-head appears to have been formed on the same principle as those of the Boisgemans, or Boschmen, i. e. Woodlanders, in Southern Africa, part of which being poisoned, on withdrawing the arrow remained in the wound, for in this way only can I account for the division at the point, and the perforation above it."
- ↑ Sir Samuel Meyrick observes, "This very interesting specimen of the javelin is new to me. The javelin used by the ancient Britons, either in close encounter, or to throw and recover by means of a thong affixed, was called Aseth, and its blade appears to have been long and slender, whence the proverb Aseth ni flyco nid da, 'the Aseth that will not bend is not good.' It may be remembered that the javelins which the Velites in the Roman army threw, but did not recover, had their blades so flat and thin as to break in whatever they struck, that they might not be used a second time."
