Tyne and Wear HER(1416): Newcastle, River Tyne, bronze rapier - Details
1416
Newcastle
Newcastle, River Tyne, bronze rapier
Newcastle
NZ26SW
Armour and Weapons
Weapon
Rapier
Prehistoric
Bronze Age
Find
Said to have been recovered from the Tyne at Newcastle before 1887, but there is no evidence for a precise findspot. The object, 495 mm long, is described as follows: "Rapier with notched butt, probably cut down from a butt with two rivet holes. Blade has well-marked central ridge and flat lozenge-shaped section; edges are bevelled". It has been suggested that this was one of the three daggers which had been in R. Blair's possession before they passed into the Greenwell Collection, and so to the British Museum.
24
63
NZ2463
<< HER 1416 >> W. Greenwell, 1889, Ancient British Implements of Bronze, etc.Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle, 2, III (for 1887-88), 309
W. Greenwell in W. Page, ed. 1905, Early Man, Victoria County History, Durham, I, 207
P. Brewis, 1907, Exhibited, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle, 3, II (for 1905-06), opp. 194, no. 8
B.A.V. Trump, 1962, The Origin and Development of British Middle Bronze Age Rapiers,Proceedings Prehistoric Society, New Series, XXVIIII, p. 98
C.B. Burgess, 1968, Bronze Age Dirks and Rapiers... Transactions Architectectural & Archaeological Society of Durham and Northumberland, 2, I, p. 5 fig. 2.5
M.H. Dodds, 1930, Prehistoric Period, Northumberland County History, XIII, pp. 20, 22, no. 17
R. Miket, 1984, The Prehistory of Tyne and Wear, p. 40, and fig. 12, p. 42, no. 16