Irish Early Bronze Age Exports found on the Continent and their Derivatives

Abstract

(p. 184)

When the distribution of decorated axes and lunulae and their imitations is plotted on a map which covers Ireland, Britain and the Continent (Fig. 3), it is of interest to note that these types are well represented outside Wessex, particularly in the Highland Zone including Cornwall, but that, with few exceptions, they avoid the area of the Wessex Culture. The same is true of the halberds. This would intimate that the trade route from Ireland to Germany via the English Channel did not go through the territory of the Wessex middlemen, but by-passed it, calling in instead at Cornwall to collect tin. The concentration of lunulae in the Cotentin peninsula further suggests that Normandy played a more important role on this trade-route than it has been given credit for hitherto. From there the route probably went eastwards up the English Channel before striking inland, either west of the Rhine or from the mouth of the Rhine up river - or both.