42 Trananctions. 



and Greystone) and one in Wigtownsliire (Whirlpool) described 

 by the same writer. Thus, a record of five widely-separated 

 localities marked by pre-historic sculptures was then made for 

 the South of Scotland. During the summer of last year (1886) 

 there was found by Mr William Thompson of Kirkcudbright a 

 highly important addition to our local rock-sculptures in the 

 neighbourhood of what once were the village and Kirk of Dunrod, 

 in the centre of a district teeming with relics of ancient times. 

 I repeat, a most important discovery this, since there were found, 

 not merely oval or irregularly-circular hollows in the rock (such 

 fis lead one to doubt the nature of the marks), but distinct cup- 

 shaped cavities surrounded by a clearly-cut ring, and not only by 

 one such ring but by many concentric rings, and besides these, 

 certain grooves or gutters connected with them ; all so arranged 

 as evidently subservient to some plan and purpose. Before pro- 

 ceeding to describe some of the designs which characterise our 

 Dunrod and other sculpturings, it will be well to familiarise the 

 eye with their general form by noting the seven types into which 

 Simpson collected these strange figures. (See Plate I.) 



Type 1. — Single Cups. These may be arranged in any manner, sym- 

 metric or not. Sometimes (as at Balmae) a solitary cup is the only cutting 

 on a rock. They may occur in couples and triads, as at High Banks ; in 

 long lines, as at Ratho, where the face of a rock forming part of a 

 "Druidical" circle is perpendicularly bisected by a line of cups ; or, as at 

 Old Bewick (Northumberland), where a horizontal line of cups is cut along 

 the sides of a rock ; or again, they may be clustered together and scattered 

 over the surface of a rock quite undesignedly. 



Type^ 2. — Cup surrounded by a single ring. 



Type. 3. — Cup surrounded by a series of concentric rings. 



Type. 4- — Cup surrounded by a series of concentric but incomplete 

 rings, having a straight radial groove. Prof. Simpson thought this the 

 most common. 



Type 5. — Cup surrounded by concentric rings which are extended into 

 lines. 



Type 6. — Concentric rings without any central or other cup. 



Type 7. — Spirals or volutes — the central point being usually marked by 

 a cup-like excavation. Prof. Simpson says this is perhaps the rarest form 

 in Britain, but is common in Ireland and Brittany. 



I hope to make it clear that with the exception of the spiral, 

 we have in one small district in tlie Stewartry all these types 

 represented, and some new ones. The rock containing the 

 strange marks which arrested the eye of William Tliompson is a 

 rather smooth northward-sloping piece of " whinstone " (a form 

 of Greywacke), in one of the large and rich pasture fields known 



