File:Early Bronze Age food vessel.jpg

These clay containers are Early Bronze Age funerary pottery, known as 'Food Vessels'. Some nineteenth-century antiquarians surmised that they were made to carry food to sustain the dead on their journey to the afterlife. Scientific analyses of residue indicate that some vessels contained porridge or ale. Usually found in stone-lined cist graves and associated with either cremations or interments, such vessels and other grave goods, particularly bronze gathers, suggest a high social status of the dead. The vessels were made by coiling clay and baking it in open fires. The bowl is similar to Scottish food vessels, while the vase may be an insular Irish Tradition.