Dr Hibbcrt on the Vitrified Cairns of Orkney. 317 



first is, — To what uses or observances is the effect of vitri- 

 fication attributable ? While the second is, To what people is 

 the effect attributable ? In a tone of confidence, therefore, we 

 are now entitled to reply, — That Vitrification was merely inci- 

 dental to the fires which were kindled upon beacon stations : 

 and that the people who in every country which ihey occupied 

 or colonized, organized systems of beacon stations, were of Scan- 

 dinavian origin. 



You will also, my dear Sir, readily perceive, that the appli- 

 cation of this conclusion to the theory of the vitrified forts of 

 Scotland, (for I do not rank Orkney as a part of Scotland 

 proper,) is a most important one. But I would not enter upon 

 the disquisition here, which would be only to anticipate the 

 memoir on the subject which I owe to the Antiquarian Society 

 of Scotland, with whose encouragement my investigations on 

 this subject have hitherto been uniformly honoured. If you 

 will therefore accept my present crude impressions on this sub- 

 ject, I give thein to you as follows : — 



First, That the vitrified sites of Orkney not being charac- 

 terized, as in Scotland, by the presence of stone ramparts, but 

 simply by small cairns upon which the fuel for beacon fires 

 had been placed, incontestibly shew, that a beacon station was 

 not of necessity a place of strength or defence. 



Secondly, That such of the ancient Duns or strengths of 

 Scotland proper, in which vitrification is found to be an occa- 

 sional occurrence, belong to the oldest fortified sites in the 

 country, and are referable to some of its earliest inhabitants, 

 probably to the Ficts, who are supposed to be of German origin. 



Thirdly, That these ancient Duns, not originally vitrified, 

 indicate, by their construction and extent, that they were used 

 by a people who had already passed from the hunting to the 

 pastoral state; as they evidently comprehend in their design 

 the protection of cattle, with that of human defence. 



Fourthly, That from the tenth to the fourteenth century, a 

 considerable part of Scotland was overrun by the Scandinavians 

 under the various names of Northmen and Danes, who reci- 

 procally became themselves liable to invasion from other pirati- 

 cal tribes of the same northern origin as themselves, and Were 

 therefore induced to institute systems of heaenn (ins, in imita- 

 tion of those with which they had been familial in Norway. 



