374 Mr. PETEIE'S Inquiry into the Origin and 



reach of the besieger. The signal once made, announcing the approach of a foe, by those who kept 

 watch on the top, the alarm spread instantaneously, not only among the inmates of the cloister, but 

 the inhabitants were roused to arms in the country many miles round. Should the barbarian, in 

 the interval, before succour arrived, succeed in ransacking the convent, and afterwards attempt to 

 force his entrance into the Tower, a stone, dropped from on high, would crush him to atoms." 

 pp. 65, 66. 



Thus also the judicious Sir Walter Scott, in his Keview of Kitson's Annals 

 of the Caledonians, Picts and Scots, in the forty-first volume of the Quarterly 

 Review, 1829 : 



" It is here impossible to avoid remarking, that at Abernethy and at Brechin there are still in 

 existence two of the round towers, of which so many occur in Ireland. Abernethy is said, by uni- 

 form tradition, to have been the capital of the Picts, and Brechin in the same district (now the 

 county of Angus) was certainly a place of early importance. In Ireland there exist nearly thirty 

 of these very peculiar buildings, which have been the very cruces antiquariorum. They could not 

 have been beacons, for they are often (at Abernethy in particular) placed in low and obscure situa- 

 tions, though there are sites adjacent well calculated for watch-towers. They could not be hermi- 

 tages, unless we suppose that some caste of anchorites had improved on the idea of Simon Stylites, 

 and taken up their abode in the hollow of such a pillar as that of which the Syrian holy man was 

 contented to occupy the top. They could hardly be belfries, for though always placed close or 

 near to a church, there is no aperture at the top for suffering the sound of the bells to be heard. 

 Minarets they might have been accounted, if we had authority for believing that the ancient Chris- 

 tians were summoned to prayers like the Mahometans by the voice of criers. It is, however, all but 

 impossible to doubt that they were ecclesiastical buildings ; and the most distinct idea we are able 

 to form of them is, from the circumstance that the inestimably singular scene of Irish antiquities, called 

 the Seven Churches in the County of Wicklow, includes one of those round towers, detached in the 

 usual manner, and another erected on the gable end of the ruinous chapel of St. Kevin, as if some 

 architect of genius had discovered the means of uniting the steeple and the church. These towers 

 might, possibly, have been contrived for the temporary retreat of the priest, and the means of pro- 

 tecting the ' holy things' from desecration on the occasion of alarm, which in those uncertain times 

 suddenly happened, and as suddenly passed away. These edifices at Brechin and Abernethy, how- 

 ever, were certainly constructed after the introduction of Christianity, and were, in all probability, 

 built in imitation of the same round towers in Ireland, under the direction of the Irish monks who 

 brought Christianity into Scotland. We may notice, however, that the masonry of these towers is 

 excellent, and may be held, in some sort, to bear witness to the popular tradition, that the Picts 

 were skilful in architecture." pp. 147, 148. 



And lastly, the able and learned John Pinkerton recognizes the principle 

 of defence as an original object in the construction of these Towers, though he 

 considered their use as belfries as the primary one. Speaking of the Round 



