EMAP_2012_Report_6_1.pdf (7.3 MB) - The Heritage Council

perhaps adopted only by a minority (although further examination of distribution and
chronology would be needed to assess this possibility), or may suggest that belts could have
been fastened in other ways.
Ornaments
A broad range of ornaments is known from early medieval Ireland, not all of which come
from excavated contexts or settlement sites. Personal ornaments are by their nature small,
portable objects; as such it might be expected that they could be easily transported, traded
or exchanged over distances. As noted above, only some of these items appear in the literary
or pictorial sources; archaeological evidence provides significant additional information on the
types and details, and potentially how they were used. However, it has also been noted that
the artefactual evidence does not always support the literary descriptions, perhaps because
of the use of specific conventions in the written texts; the precious metals in descriptions of
brooches and pins in the Táin, for example, are in inverse proportion to those found in the
artefactual evidence (Mallory 1986).
The distribution of personal ornaments is fairly wide, with examples occurring in 216 of the
317 sites in the gazetteer. The absence of personal ornaments from almost one-third of the
total sites surveyed might perhaps reflect the extent of the excavations, or the nature of the
sites; ornaments were found at only seven of 22 souterrain sites, for example, while all of the
cemetery/settlement sites surveyed had some personal ornaments. But all of the site types
are represented among those producing ornaments (see Fig. 7.1 below).
Fig. 7.1: Breakdown of the 216 sites with personal ornaments by site type
The contexts of the personal ornaments vary across the sites; for the most part excavated
examples on settlement sites are not directly in contexts which suggest their use – occurring
in ditches or pits, or as unstratified finds. One notable exception is Deer Park Farms, where
several of the ornaments (including a brooch and several beads) were found not only within
the houses, but in some cases in the bedding areas, allowing them to be considered directly
in connection with the inhabitants and their daily lives (Lynn & McDowell 2011, 333). The
degree of preservation on this site allows such associations to be made, which may not be
apparent in other excavations. Ornaments in burials are rare, but occasional examples may
108