o

es in the National Collection and one of bronze;

tead of two folded ribbons a flat one and two halves of another were used, after being fastened together, the twisting being done in the same way. In some of the Irish examples the body of the torc is plain, or was grooved to simulate the appearance of the twisted torc. A peculiar feature of these torcs is the large hooks with which they are provided. It must be noted that whereas twisted torcs of bronze are fairly common in England and France there is only one bronze torc in the Irish National Collection, and, as mentioned above, the provenance of this is doubtful. The dating of these twisted torcs is a matter of difficulty, as there are only two instances of their having been found in association with bronze objects, one in the case of the Grunty Fen torc which was discovered with three bronze palstave

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from Tara a

7

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ne of which appears to have been prepared for twisting and left

re fairly common, and some of these are so sm

b.c., when Flaminius Nepos gained his victory over the Gauls on the Addua, it is related that instead of the Gauls dedicating, as they h

m their ancestor, T. Manlius, who, having slain a gigantic Gaul in b.c

contact from about 240 to 160 b.c. The twisted torc appears to have been replaced in Ireland about the second century b.c. by the plain torc, which was probably introduced from Gaul. The fine gold torc from Clonmacnois (Plate IX), with La Tène decoration, is a good example of