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Fire-dogs Again

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Stuart Piggot
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Extract

In Antiquity for 1942 (1) Iorwerth Peate made a stimulating contribution to our understanding of the iron fire-dogs which are such a striking feature of British Iron Age craftsmanship, and in these notes that follow I hope to show that Mr Peate’s thesis can be further substantiated by additional evidence from archaeology and modern folk-life. It is his central idea that I have followed: my paper is a postscript to his.

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Antiquity , Volume 22 , Issue 85 , March 1948 , pp. 21 - 28
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Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1948

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References

1 I. C. Peate, ‘The Double-ended Fire-dog’, ANTIQUITY XVI (1942), 64-70.

2 R. E. M. Wheeler, Report on the Excavations . . . in Lydney Park (Soc. Ant. Research Committee Report, 1932), 75; C. Fox, Ant., Journ., XIX (1939), 448.

3 R. A. Smith, ‘On Late-Celtic Antiquities discovered at Welwyn, Herts’, Arch. 1-30. LXIII (1912).

4 H. Dryden, ‘Roman and Romano-British Remains at and near Shefford, Beds’, Cambs. Ant. Soc. Pubs. 1845, 17; the fire-dogs and tripod ‘would have supported four spits and six boiling-pots’ but only two spits and no pots were actually found.

5 P. Jacobsthal, Early Celtic Art (1944),106, 142.

6 De Situ Orbis III ; cf. T. D. Kendrick, The Druids (1927), 87.

7 G. Arwidsson, Vulsgärde 6 (Uppsala 1942), 77, PI. 32, fig. 59.

8 ‘The Välsgarde beasts’ heads are not knobbed in the usual ‘Celtic’ manner, though knobbed horns on helmets at least are known in the Scandinavian Bronze Age (Cf. H. Norling-Christensen, Bronzealderhjaelmene fra Vikso (Copenhagen, 1946).

9 Bodleian MS Douce 6, reproduced by D. Hartley, Mediaeval Costume and Life (1931), p. 112.

10 Arch. Aeliana VI, 14 ; Cat. Alnwick Castle Mus., 203.

11 A convenient 15th century illustration is reproduced in D. Hartley and M. Elliot, Life and Work of the People of England; XV Century (1925, Pl. 30, a.

12 R. Meringer, ‘Studien zur Germanischen Volkskunde’, Mitt. Anthrop. Gesell. in Wien XXI (1891), 101-52 ; XXII (1892), 101-6; XXV (1895), 56-68 ; J. R. Bünker, ‘Das Bauernhaus in der Heanzerei (Westungarn)’, ibid, 89-154; G. Bancalari, ‘Forchungen u. Studien über das Haus’, ibid, XXVI (1896), 93-128. For Hungarian fire-dogs see also Debreceni Déri Múzeum Eukönyve 1934 (Debrecen Museum Year Book) p. 206, figs. 19, 20.

13 Bancalari, loc. cit., fig. 149.

14 Archiv. f. Anthropologie NS V (1906), Corres. 128; Reallexikon 11, 126, Pl. 66.

15 In G. Buschan’s Illustrierte Völkerkunde, III (Stuttgart 1926), 457-460.

16 C. Fox, A Find of the Early Iron Age from Llyn Cerrig Bach, Anglesey (1947), 12.