It is yet another demonstration of how complex their relationship to the metal had become. What mattered most was not that the object was made of bronze. Much of the real cachet lay in its source, where and from whom it had been obtained. There is something almost deliberately awkward or contrary about what was going on. Often it is in those areas furthest from any natural sources of copper and tin – south-eastern England, for example – that the largest volumes of hoarded bronze are found. People in Ireland, Scotland and Wales, on the other hand – parts of the country where bronze could easily
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