DRINKING CUPS. 



101 



doubt, was that of the other ; and it can scarcely be questioned 

 that they were the receptacles of food, and as such were placed 

 in the grave. Like the 'food vessels'' they have occasionally 

 been found to contain a dark-coloured substance, which has all 

 the appearance of being the remains of solid food, and which 

 analysis has shown to be sometimes of animal, at other times of 

 vegetable, origin. No liquid could have left such a residuum, 

 and in fact the vessels are too porous in texture ever to have 

 retained fluid for any length of time. It has been suggested 



Fig. 89. f 



that they were intended to hold a light ; but besides their in- 

 appropriateness for any such use, there has never been seen upon 

 them, or found in them, anything which favours such a supr 

 position. A very remarkable burial, in a cist at Broomend, near 

 Inverurie, Aberdeenshire, may help us towards a solution of the 

 question 1 . The cist contained two skeletons, of a man and an 

 infant, with two ' drinking cups;' hanging over the edge of the 

 larger vessel, which was associated with the adult body, was an 

 article which at first was supposed to be a lamp. The cup-like 

 end was outside the vase, and the long tang- like handle was re- 

 curved over the edge, and hung down on the inside. At thq 

 bottom of both ' drinking cups' was some black earthy matter, 



1 Proc. Soc. of Ant. of Scotland, vol. vii. p. 116, whore an engraving of the larger 

 ' drinking -(rap/ and of the horn spoon, there called a lamp, is given. 



