SHELL-MOUNDS IN SCOTLAND. 233 



belonging to a later date, have, however, actually been found 

 on our coasts. They were observed by Dr. Gordon, of Birnie, 

 on the shores of the Moray Firth. I have had the advantage 

 FIG. 171. of visiting these shell-mounds with him. The largest 

 of the Scotch Kjokkenmoddings is on Loch Spynie. 

 We did not find any implements or pottery in it, 

 although we searched for several hours; but a labourer, 

 who had been employed in carting it away for manure, 

 had previously found some fragments of rude pottery 

 and a bronze pin (fig. 171). Loch Spynie has been 

 partially drained, and is shut out from the sea by a 

 great accumulation of shingle, so that the water is 

 now perfectly fresh. From ancient records it appears 

 that the shingle barrier was probably completed, and 

 the lake shut out from the sea, in the thirteenth and 

 fourteenth centuries. On the other hand, I have 

 submitted the bronze pin figured here to Mr. Franks, 

 who gives it as his opinion that it is probably not 

 older than 800 or 900 A.D. If, therefore, it really 

 belongs to the shell-mound, and there seems no reason 

 to doubt the statement of the men who found it, we 

 thus get an approximate date for the accumulation of 

 the mound itself. At St. Valery, close to the mouth 

 of the Sonime, Mr. Evans, Mr. Prestwich, and I found 

 a large accumulation of shells, from which I obtained 

 several flint flakes and some pieces of rude pottery. 

 Mr. Pengelly and Mr. Spence Bate have recently 

 described some shell-mounds in Cornwall and Devon- 

 Bronze shire. Similar remains have been observed in various 

 a'scotS! parts of the world, as, for instance, in Australia, by 

 mound. Dampier,* in Tierra del Fuego by Mr. Darwin,-)- in 

 the Malay Peninsula by Mr. Earle,J in the Andaman Islands 



* Pinkerton's Travels, vol. ii. p. 473. t Journal, p. 234. 



1 Ethnological Soc. Trans., New Ser. vol. ii. p. 119. 



