objects in one part of Europe are identical in pattern and size with those found in another part. The implements of the Bronze Age include swords, awls, knives, gouges, hammers, daggers and arrow-heads. A remarkable confirmation of the theory that the Bronze Age culture came from the East is to be found in the patterns of the arms, which are distinctly oriental; while the handles of swords and daggers are so narrow and short as to make it unlikely that they would be made for use by the large-handed races of Europe. The Bronze Age is also characterized by the fact that cremation was the mode of disposal of the dead, whereas in the Stone Age burial was the rule. Barrows and sepulchral mounds strictly of the Bronze Age are smaller and less imposing than those of the Stone Age. Besides varied and beautiful weapons, frequently exhibiting high workmanship, amulets, coronets, diadems of solid gold, and vases of elegant form and ornamentation in gold and bronze are found in the barrows. These latter appear to have been used as tribal or family cemeteries. In Denmark as many as seventy deposits of burnt bones have been found in a single mound, indicating its use through a long succession of years. The ornamentation of the period is as a rule confined to spirals, bosses and concentric circles. What is remarkable is that the swords not only show the design of the cross in the shape of the handle, but also in tracery what is believed to be an imitation of the Svastika, that ancient Aryan symbol which was probably the first to be made with a definite intention and a consecutive meaning. The pottery is all “hand-made,” and the bulk of the objects excavated are cinerary urns, usually found full of burnt bones. These vary from 12 to 18 in. in height. Their decoration is confined to a band round the upper part of the pot, or often only a projecting flange lapped round the whole rim. A few have small handles, formed of pierced knobs of clay and sometimes projecting rolls of clay, looped, as it were, all round the urn. The ornamentation consists of dots, zigzags, chevrons or crosses. The lines were frequently made by pressing a twisted thong of skin against the moist clay; the patterns in all cases being stamped into the pot before it was hardened by fire.
See Archaeology, &c. Also Lord Avebury, Prehistoric Times (1900); Sir J. Evans, Ancient Bronze Implements of Great Britain (1881); Chartre’s Age du bronze en France.
BRONZING, a process by which a bronze-like surface is imparted to objects of metal, plaster, wood, &c. On metals a green bronze colour is sometimes produced by the action of such substances as vinegar, dilute nitric acid and sal-ammoniac. An antique appearance may be given to new bronze articles by brushing over the clean bright metal with a solution of sal-ammoniac and salt of sorrel in vinegar, and rubbing the surface dry, the operation being repeated as often as necessary. Another solution for the same purpose is made with sal-ammoniac, cream of tartar, common salt and silver nitrate. With a solution of platinic chloride almost any colour can be produced on copper, iron, brass or new bronze, according to the dilution and the number of applications. Articles of plaster and wood may be bronzed by coating them with size and then covering them with a bronze powder, such as Dutch metal, beaten into fine leaves and powdered. The bronzing of gun-barrels may be effected by the use of a strong solution of antimony trichloride.
BRONZINO, IL, the name given to Angelo Allori (1502–1572), the Florentine painter. He became the favourite pupil of J. da Pontormo. He painted the portraits of some of the most famous men of his day, such as Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio. Most of his best works are in Florence, but examples are in the National Gallery, London, and elsewhere.
BRONZITE, a member of the pyroxene group of minerals, belonging with enstatite and hypersthene to the orthorhombic series of the group. Rather than a distinct species, it is really a ferriferous variety of enstatite, which owing to partial alteration has acquired a bronze-like sub-metallic lustre on the cleavage surfaces. Enstatite is magnesium metasilicate, MgSiO3, with the magnesia partly replaced by small amounts (up to about 5%) of ferrous oxide; in the bronzite variety, (Mg,Fe)SiO3, the ferrous oxide ranges from about 5 to 14%, and with still more iron there is a passage to hypersthene. The ferriferous varieties are liable to a particular kind of alteration, known as “schillerization,” which results in the separation of the iron as very fine films of oxide and hydroxides along the cleavage cracks of the mineral. The cleavage surfaces therefore exhibit a metallic sheen or “schiller,” which is even more pronounced in hypersthene than in bronzite. The colour of bronzite is green or brown; its specific gravity is about 3.2–3.3, varying with the amount of iron present. Like enstatite, bronzite is a constituent of many basic igneous rocks, such as norites, gabbros, and especially peridotites, and of the serpentines which have been derived from them. It also occurs in some crystalline schists.
Bronzite is sometimes cut and polished, usually in convex forms, for small ornamental objects, but its use for this purpose is less extensive than that of hypersthene. It often has a more or less distinct fibrous structure, and when this is pronounced the sheen has a certain resemblance to that of cat’s-eye. Masses sufficiently large for cutting are found in the norite of the Kupferberg in the Fichtelgebirge, and in the serpentine of Kraubat near Leoben in Styria. In this connexion mention may be made of an altered form of enstatite or bronzite known as bastite or schiller-spar. Here, in addition to schillerization, the original enstatite has been altered by hydration and the product has approximately the composition of serpentine. In colour bastite is brown or green with the same metallic sheen as bronzite. The typical locality is Baste in the Radauthal, Harz, where patches of pale greyish-green bastite are embedded in a darker-coloured serpentine. This rock when cut and polished makes an effective decorative stone, although little used for that purpose. (L. J. S.)
BROOCH, or Broach (from the Fr. broche, originally an awl or bodkin; a spit is sometimes called a broach, and hence the phrase “to broach a barrel”; see Broker), a term now used to denote a clasp or fastener for the dress, provided with a pin, having a hinge or spring at one end, and a catch or loop at the other.
Brooches of the safety-pin type (fibulae) were extensively used in antiquity, but only within definite limits of time and place. They seem to have been unknown to the Egyptians, and to the oriental nations untouched by Greek influence. In lands adjacent to Greece, they do not occur in Crete or at Hissarlik. The place of origin cannot as yet be exactly determined, but it would seem to have been in central Europe, towards the close of the Bronze Age, somewhat before 1000 B.C. The earliest form is little more than a pin, bent round for security, with the point caught against the head. One such actual pin has been found. In its next simplest form, very similar to that of the modern safety-pin (in which the coiled spring forces the point against the catch), it occurs in the lower city of Mycenae, and in late deposits of the Mycenaean Age, such as at Enkomi in Cyprus. It occurs also (though rarely) in the “terramare” deposits of the Po valley, in the Swiss lake-dwellings of the later Bronze Age, in central Italy, in Hungary and in Bosnia. (fig. 1).[1]
Fig. 1.—Early type from Peschiera.
From the comparatively simple initial form, the fibula developed in different lines of descent, into different shapes, varying according to the structural feature which was emphasized. On account of the number of local variations, the subject is extremely complex, but the main lines of development were approximately as follows.
Towards the end of the Bronze Age the safety-pin was arched into a bow, so as to include a greater amount of stuff in its compass.
In the older Iron Age or “Hallstatt period” the bow and its accessories are thickened and modified in various directions, so as to give greater rigidity, and prominences or surfaces for decoration. The chief types have been conveniently classed by
- ↑ The illustrations of this article are from Dr Robert Forrer’s Reallexikon, by permission of W. Spemann, Berlin and Stuttgart.
