Chapter III: Part 3

"... On the floor of the chamber, three separate divisions were
distinctly visible, of which one, situated on the east side, showed
traces of having been a fireplace. Professor Wibel found several
fragments of human bones, which evidently belonged only to _one_
individual, as no portion was duplicated; also a few animals'
bones. There was an extraordinary number of fragments of pottery,
belonging to about 24 different urns, of which 11 could be put
together. Their form and ornamentation were both fine and varied,
an interesting witness to the ceramics of the grey past.... Among
the stone implements found were a great many flint-knives; two
stone hatchets, two chisels, and a gouge, all of flint, and a disc
of porphyry were also obtained. Several mineral substances,
quartzite, rubble-stones, gravel, ochre, a sinter-heap--these are
less interesting than the seven amber beads which, with some
charcoal, completes the list of objects found. Referring to former
investigations of galleried mounds [_gangbauten_], which seem to
have been used in some cases as burying-places, in others as
dwellings, Dr. Wibel observes, in answer to the question resulting
from his discovery, as to whether the Denghoog ought to be regarded
as a sepulchre or as a dwelling, that, as Nilsson has already said,
all gallery-mounds were originally dwellings, and occasionally
became utilised as tombs. In the case of the Denghoog, this fact is
demonstrated by the fireplace, the scattered potsherds, the amber
beads, &c."

[Footnote 93: _Heligoland_, Edin. and Lond., 1888, pp. 84-85.]

Of the little woodcut which forms the Tailpiece of this volume, it is hardly necessary to say that it represents some popular ideas regarding "the little people." The woodcut of which this is a facsimile is one of those contained in the eighteenth-century chap-book, "_Round about our Coal Fire_; or, Christmas Entertainments," and it heads the chapter "_Of Fairies, their Use and Dignity_." "They generally came out of a Mole-hill," it is said; "they had fine Musick always among themselves, and Danced in a Moonshiny Night around, or in a Ring as one may see at this Day upon every Common in _England_, where Mushroones [_sic_] grow," The size of the mushroom, so elegantly depicted in the foreground, is quite on a scale suitable to the stature ultimately accorded to the little people in many districts; so also is the mole-hill. But the tree, and the Satanic head in the foliage, are curiously out of proportion.

* * * * *

An examination of these various diagrams will show that the more primitive of those structures were obviously built by a small-sized race; some of the passages being quite impassable to large men of the present day. This peculiarity was noticed by Scott when visiting the "brochs" of Shetland, a kindred class of structures (none of which are here shown). "These Duns or Picts' Castles are so small," he says, writing in his Diary in August 1814, "it is impossible to conceive what effectual purpose they could serve excepting a temporary refuge for the chief." This reflection was suggested to him by the Broch of Cleik-him-in (now usually written Clickemin), near Lerwick; and in describing it he says: "The interior gallery, with its apertures, is so extremely low and narrow, being only about three feet square, that it is difficult to conceive how it could serve the purpose of communication. At any rate, the size fully justifies the tradition prevalent here, as well as in the south of Scotland, that the Picts were a diminutive race." Of the Broch of Mousa he says: "The uppermost gallery is so narrow and low that it was with great difficulty I crept through it,"--a feat which baffled the present writer.[94] In all those cases, of course, it is understood one has to crawl. As with the Lapps and the Eskimos, creeping was much more a matter of course with the builders of those places than it is with us. After getting through such passages it happens that, in several instances, the roof is higher than is required for the tallest living man. An admirable example of such a place is the underground "Picts' House" at Pitcur, in Forfarshire, which would be quite a palace to people of a small race, and very likely figures as such in some popular tale; its dimensions and appearance considerably magnified with every century.[95] But even this "fairy palace" was entered by narrow, downward-sloping passages, similar to that seen in the Frontispiece, down and up which the dwellers had to crawl. An underground gallery such as that of Ardtole (near Ardglass, County Down), is somewhat puzzling, because, while one chamber off it rises to a height of 5 feet 3 inches, another is only 3½ feet high; and the main gallery, for 70 feet of its length, is 4½ feet high, with a width of 3 feet 4 inches. The inference from this seems to be that the occupants were under 4½ feet in height. If they had intended to crawl along the 70 feet, they did not require so high a roof; whereas, if they walked, and if they were more than 4½ feet in height, they would need to walk the 70 feet in a stooping posture, a constraint which they could easily have avoided by raising the roof a foot or two. The highest roof in all this souterrain being 5 feet 3, it does not seem likely that the builders were taller than that; and there seems more reason to believe that they were much smaller. Another such gallery in Sutherlandshire is "nowhere more than 4½ feet in height, and for the greater part of its length only 2 feet wide, expanding to 3½, for about 3 feet only from the inner end." Still more restricted is the "rath-cave" of Ballyknock, in the parish of Ballynoe, barony of Kinnatalloon, County Cork. "The cave is a mere cutting in the clayey subsoil, and is roofed with flags resting on the clayey banks of the cutting, of which the length is about 100 feet, and the height and width from 3 to 3½ feet, except that the width to a height of 2 feet is hardly a foot at the N.W. turn, 23 feet from the N.E. end, and at a point 27 feet from the S.E. end.... Right below the aperture ... was a short pillar-stone, deeply scored with Oghams ... [and] many of the roofing slabs were seen ... to be inscribed with Oghams, some large and others minute."[96]

"This class of structures deserves a careful study," observes Captain Thomas, referring to the souterrains of the north-west of Scotland;[97] "for the room or accommodation afforded by this mode of building is exceedingly small when compared with the labour expended in procuring it; besides, the doorway or entry is often so contracted that no bulky object, not even a very stout man, could get in ... But what are we to think when the single passage is so small that only a child could crawl through it?"

[Footnote 94: On the very topmost course of all, the gallery dwindles into such insignificant dimensions that not even a dwarf (as one would naturally understand that term) could creep along it. Scott cannot have meant this very extremity. With regard to it, I should be inclined to say that it was merely the necessary finish of the gallery, not intended to be used any more than the spaces beside the eaves of a house.]

[Footnote 95: The tendency to "idealisation on the part of the narrator" is referred to, in this connection, by Mr. Joseph Jacobs, at p. 242 of his "English Fairy Tales" (London, D. Nutt, 1890).]

[Footnote 96: _Jour. Roy. Soc. Antiq. Ireland_, 1891 (Third Quarter), p. 517. It is not inappropriate to add that one of these inscriptions reads: "Branan, son of Ochal," and that the decipherer (the Rev. Edmond Barry, M.R.I.A.) identifies this latter name with "the name of a King of the Fairies of Connaught (_Ri Síde Connacht_)": _op. cit._, pp. 524-525. The Ardtole souterrain is described in the Journal of the same Society (July-October, 1889, p. 245), by Mr. Seaton F. Milligan, M.R.I.A.; and the one in Sutherlandshire is referred to by Dr. Joseph Anderson (at p. 289 of "Scotland in Pagan Times: The Iron Age," Edinburgh, 1883).]

[Footnote 97: _Proc. Soc. Antiq. Scot._ (First Series), vol. vii. pp. 185-6.]

_Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. London & Edinburgh._

End of Project Gutenberg's Fians, Fairies and Picts, by David MacRitchie