Ceremonial Celtic helmet from an Apulian grave

This helmet represents an extraordinarily lavish example of a Celtic type used primarily in the fourth and third centuries BC. Its dome and neck guard were made from a single thin iron sheet, covered at the top and bottom with ornamental bronze sheets worked into vegetal designs. Inlays of reddish coral or sea snail shells provide intense accents of colour.
Triangular iron cockades were secured with rivets on each side of the helmet. Further ornamentation like feathers could have been stuck into the tall tubes on each side. A solid-cast knob attached by an iron pin to the apex of the dome was once decorated with inlay, perhaps enamel. Cheekpieces were attached by hinges whose remains are still visible on the inside of the helmet. Although the cheekpieces are now missing, they were present when the helmet was discovered.
This helmet belonged to an assemblage of grave goods found in a chamber tomb in Canosa, Apulia. Judging from the finds, three warriors were buried in the tomb in the last quarter of the fourth century BC. The goods – a cuirass, a bronze belt, four iron spearheads, a horse harness, and numerous vases, in addition to the helmet – were sold shortly after their discovery at the end of the nineteenth century. Today they can be found distributed across several European and American museums.
It is curious that a helmet of Celtic origin should appear in a purely local Apulian context. Beginning in 400 BC, the Celts advanced from the west into eastern Europe; Celtic mercenary soldiers joined skirmishes all around the Mediterranean. In these battles, such a helmet could have become booty and, later, an especially valuable grave gift for an Apulian warrior. Its owner may even have modified the helmet: the tubes on either side are a feature not so much of Celtic armour as of southern Italian taste.