1 Early Bronze Age axe-ingots from Brittany: evidence for connections with south-west Ireland? HENRI GANDOIS * UMR 8215 Trajectoires, Nanterre, France, Research associate at the UMR 6566 CReAAH, Rennes AURELIEN BURLOT Department of Archaeology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland BENOÎT MILLE Centre de Recherche et de Restauration des Musées de France, Paris, France, UMR 7055 Préhistoire et technologie, Nanterre, France CECILE LE CARLIER DE VESLUD CNRS, UMR 6566 CReAAH, Rennes, France [Accepted 07 February 2019. Published 28 March 2019.] This paper examines the possibility that a variant of Irish Killaha-type axeheads, dating to the start of the Bronze Age, has been identifed in France. This pro- posed Ploukilla-type shares morphological characteristics with the classic Irish examples but is different in that the objects are poorly cast and non-functional, suggesting they are axe-ingots. The analysed French objects contain copper consistent with Type A metal from the mine at Ross Island, Co. Kerry. However, they are pure copper, in contrast to the standard Killaha type, which is represen- tative of the frst tin bronze in Ireland. The Ploukilla-type objects are concen- trated in Brittany. They suggest that copper from Ross Island was traded along the Atlantic seaboard of north-west France, where no direct evidence of contem- porary exploitation of copper sources is known. Killaha metalworking represents the frst phase of tin bronze production in Ireland similar to the Brithdir/Migdale assemblages in Britain, which are dated 2200–2050 BC (Needham 2017; Needham et al. 2017). The Killaha phase started during the 22nd century BC and may have lasted until 2000/1900 BC, but this early bronze phase is not well understood due to a lack of associated dateable material (cf. Brindley 2001; O’Brien 2004). The Killaha phase is characterised by *Author’s email: henri.gandois@gmail.com ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2103-494X  doi: https://doi.org/10.3318/PRIAC.2019.119.04 Abstract Introduction Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy Vol. 119C, 1–36 © 2019 Royal Irish Academy