Bronze flat axe

Collection type: Object
Description: Bronze flat axe
Long description: Bronze flat axe with a thick butt and flat sides, slightly convex in outline. [MN 30/01/2009]
Geographical reference: Ireland, Republic of
Europe > Northern Europe > Ireland, Republic of; "Ireland": ie Ireland or Northern Ireland (UK)
Person: Maker Unknown Maker; Field collector Unknown Collector; PRM source Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers founding collection
Date / Period: Archaeological period: Early Bronze Age
Date collected: By 1874
Acquisition information: Donated: 1884
Materials and processes: Material Copper Alloy Metal, Material Tin Metal, Process Cast, Process Forged (Metal)
Dimensions: Thick: max 10 mm, Width: max 65 mm, Length: max 101 mm, Weight 362 g
Object numbers: Accession number: 1884.119.34 Other numbers: 5 318 1433.2316 PR Cat other PR nos: 2316
Research and responses: Pitt Rivers was in Ireland [serving in the Army] from 1862-66, this object may have been obtained during this period [Bowden, 1991: 60-4] [AP Leverhulme project on founding collection 1995-1998]
In the late 1940s or 1950s, a drilling was taken from this object for elemental analysis and a sample removed for metallographic examination as part of the work of the Ancient Mining and Metallurgy Committee of the Royal Anthropological Institute. For the results of the analysis, see under 'Publications'. [MN 30/03/2009]
Associated publications: For the results of the analysis of a drilling taken from this object (and assigned the serial number 1433.2316), see page 19, table 3 of 'Studies of Irish and British Early Copper Artifacts: Second Series: Reports of the Ancient Mining and Metallurgy Committee of the Royal Anthropological Institute', in Man, Vol. 54 (1954), pp. 18-27. A copy of this report is in RDF: Researchers File: Case. This article is also available on JSTOR. The stable URL is http://www.jstor.org/stable/2795224. [MN 29/01/2009] For the results of the analysis of a drilling taken from this object (and assigned the serial number 38), see pages 110-111 of 'Early Metallurgy of Copper in Ireland and Britain', by H. H. Coghlan and Humphrey Case, in Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, Vol. 23 (1957), pp. 91-123. Coghlan and Case classify this object as being a Group 1 metal: "These metals tend to be relatively high in arsenic, antimony and silver, and low in nickel and bismuth; contain low and variable lead, and little or no tin or zinc, and very liitle or no gold; and are normally practically free of iron...[it is thought that] the great majority of these metals were sulphide-carrying ores...With little doubt, the group is typically a product of Irish mining and metallurgy.". [Coghlan and Case 1957: 98 - 99] A copy of this report is in RDF: Researches File: Coghlan. [MN 29/01/2009] Illustrated in black and white in Plate XXV(a) (left) in Science in Archaeology: A Comprehensive Survey of Progress and Research, edited by Don Brothwell and Eric Higgs (London: Thames and Hudson, 1963), where it illustrates the essay 'Optical Emission Spectroscopy and the Study of Metallurgy in the European Bronze Age', by Dennis Britton and Eva E. Richards, pp. 499-509. Caption reads: '...flat axe of copper (Ireland, later Neoltihic)...'. (Photocopy in RDF: Researchers: Britton.) [JC 27 2 2009] Listed as number 318 under category 'Type Lough Ravel' on page 18 of The Axes of the Early Bronze Age in Ireland (Prähistorische Bronzefunde, IX, 1), by Peter Harbison (Munich: C. H. Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1969): '318. Provenance unknown. Pitt-Rivers Mus., Oxford (1433.2316). Case, Man 54, 1954 No. 21, 19 Table III; 21 Fig. 2; 22 Fig. 3,5; 26 No. 5; Coghlan/Case, PPS. 23, 1957, 110 Anal. 38; Thompson, in: Science and Archaeology (1963) Pl. 26 a, left. (Pl. 13.6).' See also line-drawing in Plate 13.6 (unpaginated). NB See above for the correct reference for the illustration in Science and Archaeology. [MN 29/01/2009; JC 5 2 2009] Published under catalogue number 5 on pages 60-61 of Allen, I.M., Britton, D., and Coghlan, H.H., 1970, 'Metallurgical Reports on British and Irish Bronze Age Implements in the Pitt Rivers Museum', Occasional Papers on Technology 10, Oxford University Press, Oxford: 'Copper Flat Axes; Description. Flat axe. Butt thick, slightly convex in outline. Cutting-edge originally sharpened, now partly blunt. Sides flat, except for a shallow groove above each corner of the cutting edge. Surfaces smooth in places with recent burnish. [Drawing] Analysis Chemical Analysis: As 2.3%, Sb 0.21% Spectrographic analysis: Pb 0.01%, Ni <0.001%, Bi 0.001%, Fe<0.005%, Ag 0.3% [Indicates copper alloy but not bronze] Metallographic examination Examination revealed recrystallized twinned grains superimposed on a cored structure [refers to Fig. 5, image 1]. A number of fairly large cracks and cavities were present at one edge [refers to Fig. 5, image 2]: these had probably been produced during forging and heat treatment. Oxide inclusions were present. The hardness was 85.5 HB.' [GB 20/5/2005, MN 29/01/2009, CMP 09/08/2010]

Search terms: Tool, Weapon, Axe