Peelhill Hoard
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Glasgow Museums has a collection of 72 bronze artefacts and associated wooden hafting remains, known as the Peelhill Hoard. The objects were recovered in 1961 from a bog at Peelhill Farm, near Drumclog, in South Lanarkshire, after being discovered during drainage works. The items are Late Bronze Age, and date to around 950–750 BC. The Peelhill Hoard consists of 29 complete/partial spearheads, one tubular ferrule or spearbutt, one socketed axehead, one Ewart Park type sword, three rings (which may have been used as scabbard belt-loops), and fragments of burnt and unburnt wood which represent the remains of some of the spearhead hafts. Most of the items have been damaged, by bending, breaking, or burning (or a combination of all three), and some of the objects are partially melted or in several pieces. This type of treatment, and similar object types, are also seen in the Duddingston Loch Hoard, from Edinburgh, which is in the collections of National Museums Scotland. It was previously thought that the Peelhill Hoard was a collection of scrap metal deposited for safe-keeping and which was never recovered, but it is probably better interpreted as a collection of weapons and their accoutrements (such as the ferrule and rings) which were deposited in the bog as a ritual or religious offering.
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