Notes on (1) a Casket of Cetacean Bone; and (2) a Highland Brooch of Silver

Abstract

The Eglinton casket is made of whale bone with bronze mountings and is decorated with Celtic interlaced designs carved in fairly high relief. It has much in common with an example from Fife. Some of the design can be paralleled on later medieval West Highland grave slabs and many of these also have depictions of caskets. The Kindrochit brooch was found in the ruins of the castle. It is a flat-ring brooch of a previously unknown type, made of silver with an engraved inscription whose meaning is unclear.