Sometimes these swords were covered with silver-plaiting, twisted silver and gold wires and gilded copper-plaiting.
Many swords were highly decorated, although these decorations do not always survive after hundreds of years of corrosion. Many, but not all, have elaborately decorated hilts. Most found in Dublin correspond to types found in Scandinavia between 800 and 950 AD. The difference in the shape of blades has allowed archaeologists to determine a variety of sword-types throughout the Viking world. Viking weapons have also be found occasionally in rivers and wetland contexts.Īlthough Viking weaponry initially differed from Irish weaponry, the two weapons grew steadily more similar after Viking settlement in Ireland, with the Irish adopting Viking forms and vice versa. While very little is known about these public ceremonies, the grave goods indicate that weapons and other status-items were placed with the dead by family members as symbols of the person's status in life and to provide them with items they might need in the afterlife. Many Viking weapons have been found in furnished burials: although this pagan burial custom had begun to die out among Irish Vikings several generations before the battle of Clontarf. Other tools, such as slings, clubs and even flails were mentioned as being used as weapons in some early ninth-century Irish literary sources. Usually only the iron bosses of these shields survive in the archaeological record, as the wooden body of the shield decays over time. Warriors protected themselves from attack by using small round shields. Unfortunately, these sword types were no match for the Viking slashing swords and the Irish quickly began to adapt Viking blade forms into the manufacturing of their weapons. the claideb, a longer sword designed for slashing or cutting (similar to the Roman gladius). the colg, thought to be a small thrusting sword (similar to the Roman spatha) There were two types of swords in Ireland before the Vikings: This treatment is thought to have been religious or ritual in nature and the fact that we dont tend to find axes in similar contexts alongside these other weapons would indicate that axes didnt have the same 'aura' around them that weapons created specifically for battle like swords and spears did.Swords on the other hand, were expensive and usually used only by the nobility.Īccording to Nancy Edwards when the Irish came into contact with Romans they abandoned a particular La Tène type of sword in favour of smaller versions of the Roman spatha and gladius. Some swords also show that the Irish metalworkers may also have been influenced by the Germanic world. Swords and spears from this period are often found in the same stretches of river and the same areas of bogs and or lakes. In terms of polearms we only have spears such as those from lisnacrogher. Weaponry from Ireland at this time is known almost exclusively from finds in wet places such as rivers and bogs. However, leaving aside the existence or not of a 'Celtic' race or group or ethnicity anywhere in Europe at this time we can say with some certainty that neither Britain nor Ireland saw a large incoming movement of people from continental Europe. It was believed until relatively recently by archaeologists that 'Celtic' people from the continent invaded Britain and Ireland during this time bringing their culture and art. The period about which you're asking is the Iron Age, which in Ireland runs from roughly 800 BC to AD 400. If you've any further questions don't hesitate to ask! I can try my best to help. This was a website put together by a group associated with my university, it's concise but a useful primer on weaponry in early medieval Ireland: Mallory also has something on the subject in In Search of the Irish Dreamtime, and he's quite accessible even to a layperson. There's precious little really written about weaponry in early medieval Ireland (at least from a historical viewpoint I'm a historian rather than archaeologist by training), but if you're interested in the subject I would recommend Bartlett's Military History of Ireland. The concept of the battle axe was however adopted readily, and within a century or so it was an extremely common weapon among the Gaelic Irish. Prior they were only considered as tools, and the Gaels mostly fought with spear. No, the Vikings introduced the axe as a weapon to Ireland, so you're looking at the 9th century onwards.