Irish bracers have their own distinctive character: they are red or grey/black, and are long and narrow in outline with convex sides, and sometimes end borings. Just a few specific rock types were used, including highly distinctive red jasper. These may have held symbolic meanings and included rocks previously selected for Neolithic axe head manufacture, especially porcellanite. Irish bracers are more similar to continental examples than to those from mainland UK and a direct link with the Atlantic seaboard and most especially with Brittany seems to be indicated, following on from the links between Irish and Breton megalithic tombs. The bracers made from the highly valued Irish jasper may have been manufactured at specific workshops, and many such bracers were subsequently broken, and then re-bored as smaller bracers or reworked as pendants. There is evidence that some of them were deliberately broken so that they could be employed in processes of social enchainment. Thus the symbolic importance of the raw materials, and biographies of individual objects, prevailed over many centuries and generations.
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Last updated: Wed Jul 29 2009