Helmet of Agris

Zakri M. Kneebone
Section 1
Object: Helmet of Agris
Origin: Discovered in Agris, Charente, France.
Culture, Period: Celtic, Late Bronze or Early Iron.
Dates: ca. 375-350 BCE.
Museum: Museum of Angouleme (Angouleme, France)


The Helmet of Agris is a full sized helmet fitting to the forehead with a small neck guard. Also attached is a paragnithides, or cheek-guard: its mate is unfortunately undiscovered since the pieces were scattered about by animals. Despite the aesthetic pleasantness the lost piece would contribute, it is considered one of, if not the best Celtic object of art ever recovered in France.
There are three main parts: the timbre1 or stamp made of iron, the panels of bronze with gold leaf and the attachments. The stamp is a very plain kettle of iron, designed to be invisible except for a set of lock-rivets about the great arch to hold the panels in place. Each of the lock-rivets is shaped like a modern thumbscrew and secures one end of each of a pair of semicircular panels. The stamp is quite thin so that it is highly unlikely that the helmet was intended for military duty. At the very top is a rounded, ringed crest reminiscent of the capitol of the queen in a modern chess set. Set into the crest is a broken black wood dowel which probably held some kind of pennant.
The panels are seven in number composing four concentric bands: a top panel and three longer bands made of two panels each, riveted on the sides. The panels are bronze sheet, covered in gold leaf mined from the Central Massif of France which is refined to 99%, an exceptional purity for the time. The sheets are stamped out in low-relief and embossed with linear plant patterns.
The top panel is thematically the most disparate of the four bands, the theme here is comprised of a coral inlay depicting a writhing serpent with the head of a carnivore, perhaps a canine, with horns on the head. This is the only subject which is considered uniquely Celtic.
The remaining three panels form a rhythm of complex alternations. An external alternation is created by the second and fourth (bottom) bands and an internal alternation by the third. The eye is
Helmet of Agris by Zakri Kneebone 2
first drawn to the third panel because it is the only one that is not encrusted with coral and is consequently brighter and lighter in tint and is the finest and most intricately stamped of the bands. Also, it is the tallest of the bands and occupies approximately 30% of the height of the helmet and is centered on the great circumference. The design consists of pairs of symmetrically opposed esses, these pairs forming a sinusoid. There the negative space resembles a rain drop, alternating in vertical inversion and inside this space is a lotus leaf oriented upward or downward likewise tessellating the circumference of the band. Each lotus leaf matches the palmette motif as a pair of palmettes on their sides in a vertical symmetry. A triangular shape is made by the interstitial (a minor, “left-over” section of the plane in a tesselation) with the border and in this space is a small vine, curled about itself in a triskele (a threefold spiral). The borders contain tiny half-oval florets with three points pointing upward on top and downward on bottom.
The second and fourth bands have a reflective resemblance, forming a second rhythm surrounding that of the third band and augmenting it. Palmettes, inverted in the second (upper) band, occupy a corresponding space on those panels. A palmette is a small lotus which most likely is the influence of Greek Classical architecture and also very likely via the Etruscans. Of the bands the second is shorter and likewise the palmettes are inverted and structurally smaller having only five leaves. The palmettes were originally accentuated with a piece of corral fitted to each and every shaped outlined in the panels and each corral is likewise fastened by a rivet adorned with a gilded bronze rivet head conforming to contour. Due to wear about one quarter of the corral remains intact.
The fourth band is thematically identical to the second and is nearly so identical except for vertical orientation a proportionally higher degree of complexity relative to its larger dimensions. The palmettes are seven-leaved and the interstitials are also spiral curly vines centered by triskeles. Likewise, the palmettes are accented with corral and rivets.
Finally, below the panels is a band of colored corral which meets a neck guard at the rear. The
Helmet of Agris by Zakri Kneebone 3
neck-guard is iron, covered in corral and riveted to the kettle. Hanging from the right side of the kettle is a lonesome paranthides, or cheek-guard, made of thin iron rods which are bronzed and gilded. It is an inverted palmette, the largest of all, with elaborately scrolled esses and fine gold wire curls between the larger curls.

Bibliography
Museum of Angouleme online http://www.angouleme.fr/museeba/

Encyclopédie de l'Arbre Celtique online http://encyclopedie.arbre-celtique.com/

Numbered and untitled article, Gomez De Soto, José and Verger, Stephane, originally published in "L'archéologue, 106 (2010) 56-59" halshs-00455391, version 1 - 10 Feb 2010; retrieved from http://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/45/53/91/PDF/Agris_l_archeologue.2.pdf

Notes: All of the sources are in French with which I am familiar but am not an expert; I use Google Translate profusely. Since it would be improper and detrimental to translate the proper French names of my resources, I feel the apostrophes therein are absolutely necessary. Precise measurements and weights are not available anywhere, but the nice folks at the Museum of Angouleme are sending me a pamphlet which has not arrived.

1 Can be translated as stamp or kettle: Google translate. Since kettle is more visual I relate the terms together.

Correspondance Francais

Bonjour,

Merci pour votre message. Nous pouvons vous envoyer la publication sur le casque, mais seulement par la poste, nous n'avons pas de version numérique. Pouvez-vous me donner votre adresse et nous vous l'enverrons cette semaine. Si jamais vous aviez besoin d'informations rapidement sur le casque, vous pouvez contacter notre archéologue au musée : Jean-François Tournepiche :


Merci et bonnes recherches.
Cordialement

Lionel Markus
Responsable du service des publics
Le Musée d'Angoulême
1, rue Friedland
16000 Angoulême
05.45.95.07.69

"Pour réduire notre empreinte écologique, merci de n'imprimer que l'indispensable, et d'utiliser le recto-verso autant que possible"


>>> my email removed 01/02/2011 05:57 >>>

Bonjour Monsieur,
S'il vous plaît pardonnez-moi si mon français est terne, mais je sais
seulement un peu. J'espère que cette lettre vous trouvera en bonne
santé.
Mon nom est Zakri Kneebone et je suis étudiant à l'Université de
Wisconsin-Whitewater et je suis avec vous concernant le casque d'Agris
parce que j'écris un texte formel descriptif. J'espérais que vous
pourriez me dire des propos de la pièce. Je sais que certains
renseignements de base sur ça où il a été exhumé et les matériaux
utilisés pour rendre le casque.
Il ya quelques faits dont je suis curieux, mais ne peut pas trouver pour
moi-même. Plus précisément, la mesure et la masse de l'objet et quelles
que soient les données statistiques, vous pouvez trouver des notables.
Peut-être vous avez une feuille de la brochure ou des données qui vous
pouvez me l'envoyer par voie électronique, s'il vous plaît.
Je suis très reconnaissant de votre temps et d'énergie, monsieur.
Cordialement, votre ami à travers l'étang,
Zakri Kneebone.

Globalization

Globalization is a trend toward unification of the world economies. Two pros discussed in the chapter are Transnational Advocacy Networks (TANs) and merchandise trade. Two cons are cultural amalgamation and the per capita gap. Communications and transportation have facilitated the advancement of globalization.

In the last 150 years the capacity and ease of communications and transportation have, to use an idiom, made the world a smaller place. In the early 19th century a message or package from Boston to Beijing (then known as Peking) would take many, many months. Keeping in mind there were no good harbors on the West Coast, the package would go by ship around the Tierra del Fuego. And then, across the Pacific and then north along Australasia and finally through the South China Sea and Sea of Japan. Today ordinary citizens fly and send packages likewise in a matter of hours and days. Communications are now facilitated by the internet and satellite communications with a latency of about 800 miliseconds to just about anywhere in the world. (Zhang, et. al, 1997)The shattering speed of these new technologies have created a framework for improved merchandise trade and Transnational Advocacy Networks.

Anyone can join a TAN on Facebook or begin a trade relationship with someone in the Czech Republic, for instances. Last night I was looking for a platform for my mobile app and I came across a company in the Czech Republic that already makes exactly what I need. I sent them an email about a liscensing arrangement. Likewise, I joined the Facebook group for Doctors Without Borders a week ago. It was the first I had heard about the free trade agreement between the EEC and India and how it was going to impact the prices of the AIDS medicine they ship to Africa. I shared the article with my friends.

This is an effect of the per-capita disparity of EDCs and LDCs. If the large multinational pharmaceutical corporations in Europe made their medicines more affordable (to LDCs especially,) then Doctors Without Borders would not be buying black-market drugs from India. These drugs are unaffordable in Africa to families who make dollars a day.

When I was in Mexico the poolboy at the hotel offered me $50 for the shirt off my back. I paid $30 for it out-of-season and he would have paid $100 for the same brand in the store. Cultural amalgamation is Tommy Hilfiger in Mexico. It is McWorld, as the text calls it.

External links

Satellite Communications in the Global Internet: Issues, Pitfalls, and Potential. Yongguang Zhang, Dante De Lucia, Bo Ryu, Son K. Dao. Hughes Research Laboratories, USA. Retrieved from www.isoc.org/inet97/proceedings/F5/F5_1.HTM