axe;
mould
- Museum number
- 1911,1021.9
- Description
-
One half of copper alloy mould for socketed axe. Rough, mottled black inside, together light brown and olive. Matrix bordered along each side and below by grooves and ridges to key with second valve (missing). Surface corroded.
- Dimensions
-
Length: 122 millimetres
-
Weight: 415 grammes
-
Thickness: 25 millimetres
-
Width: 45 millimetres (cutting edge)
-
Width: 73 millimetres
- Curator's comments
- Burgess and Schmidt 1981 (information from catalogue no. 1469)
Cave deposit, found in the course of quarrying operations over a period of ca. 10 years in a now destroyed cave in a carboniferous limestone formation. The objects may have been deposited at different times. They usually were found on a layer of sand and gravel, coated by up to 20 cm of stalagmite. Objects of Romano-British date were found on top of this. Besides the objects, few of which can now be placed at exact find-spots, large numbers of animal bones, traces of fires and remains of at least three human individuals (one skeleton complete, suggesting an interment) were found in the cave.
Associated finds: In view of the large number of possibly associated finds (the original other six cannot of course be identified) and the admirable publication of the objects by D. Britton it seems reasonable to refer to his Inventaria Archaeologia 55 (1968). The axes from the Heathery Burn Cave include: a South-eastern Type axe (WG.1286); twelve Yorkshire axes, including the mould for their production (1911.1021.10-13; WG.1280-4; Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, Durham; Musée Thomas Dobrée et Musée Archéologique, Nantes (reg. unknown); University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Cambridge (FB 46/PB 95).
Bibliography: For references up to 1965 see Britton, D. and Longworth, I.H. (1968) Late Bronze Age Finds in the Heathery Burn Cave, Co. Durham. Inventaria Archaeologica, Great Britain IX, 55; Britton, D (1971) The Heathery Burn Cave Revisited. The British Museum Quarterly (London) 35, 20-38.
- Location
- Not on display
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1911,1021.9
