Seen & Found

A fascinating discovery in Co. Roscommon:

https://www.archaeology.org/news/9941-210816-ireland-wooden-idol

There's a link to an article in the Irish Examiner on that page which shows more images of the find. It also states that about a dozen such idols have been found in Ireland to date. There's a lovely example of one on display in the National Museum on Kildare street.

I can only recall seeing one in the Kingship & Sacrifice exhibition section of the National Museum. That one is rather small looking compared to the recent one found. I think the theory posited in the exhibition is that these idols may have been used as territorial boundary markers. Should be interesting to see what it looks like when fully conserved. As you say, it looks like we'll have to wait several years before we can see it on display. Yeah, you could imagine the fear and anguish a wayward traveller would feel coming face to face with one of these figures in a dank, misty midlands bog!

Thanks, Slowburner.

Wishful thinking on my part. Never mind! I'll keep looking 🙂.

Stone Axehead find

I decided to go field-walking for flint artefacts earlier today in a field close to my home here in south Kildare. It's a site I've found significant numbers of flint artefacts on in the past. The soil was recently ploughed with the stubble having been turned over. It hadn't been seeded yet. Shortly after midday, I spotted this lying on the surface of the ploughsoil:

As one can imagine, it was very exciting. It's the second stone axehead I've found in this particular field. I found the first one way back in 2009. That Neolithic stone axehead is now in the National Museum of Ireland. I'll contact the Duty Officer in the National Museum shortly to report the find.

I've attached more images below of the axehead following a clean. The axehead looks darker in some of the images than it actually is. I'm not sure what stone it comprises, but it may be limestone. It measures 109mm. in length. The cutting edge end measures 55mm. wide and it tapers to approximately 20mm. at the butt end.

Thank you, New Home.

Yeah, "new" Boards is a pain in the hole to navigate, hence, why I haven't been around for quite some time.

Thanks, slowburner.

There's a few tiny nibbles on the cutting edge. There's a fresh scrape on one face of the axe where it may have been clipped by the plough, but apart from that it's in very good shape.

The plan was to get an email off to the duty officer in Kildare street this evening, but just didn't get round to it. I'll do so tomorrow with a bit of luck, and send all relevant information as you've suggested.

I'm not sure if we'll ever find out if it is porphyritic andesite as you've suggested. Someone on this forum suggested the last axehead I found was dolerite, but I never had that confirmed by the NMI. I believe the ISAP team from UCD used to examine axes that were submitted to the NMI? It would be nice to get a follow-up report following its examination. I hate the thought of just handing it over and not hearing anything about it again.