1290 LIFE : OUTLINES OF GENERAL BIOLOGY 



Scotland ? All that we have now, except rats and rabbits and domesti- 

 cated forms. And to these must be added some that we have lost, 

 like reindeer, bear, and wolf. They may be divided into three 

 contingents — those distinctively Arctic, like the reindeer and the 

 lemming; those of the forests, like the Red Deer and the elk; and 

 those of the plains like the hare and the Wild Horse. 



In regard to the relations between man and the fauna of Scotland, 

 the classic book, of first-rate importance and workmanship, which 

 would have delighted Buff on himself, is Dr. James Ritchie's Influence 

 of Man on Animal Life in Scotland (1920), and to it we are of 

 course vastly indebted. But the particular aspect considered in this 

 section is not so much the influence of man on the animals, as the 

 influence of the animals on man. 



6. Let us take, then, some of the most outstanding of these 

 animals that greeted our Neolithic ancestors when they came to 

 Scotland. Let us ask what these animals meant for man, how they 

 entered into his heritage and ours. For some of them that disappeared 

 long since had probably a lasting influence. They formed at any rate 

 part of the sieve in which man was sifted. 



I. Large Animals of the Chase.— Reindeer, probably of the 

 Woodland or Caribou variet\^ persisted in the north of Scotland till 

 the twelfth century, and must have been of importance for food and 

 clothing, just as in Lapland and other northern countries to-day. 

 But they were not domesticated. The hunting of the reindeer must 

 have been part of the education of Neolithic and Metal-working 

 man. Here also should be included the Elk, the Giant Fallow Deer 

 (Irish Elk), and the Red Deer. 



Appearing first in Inter-glacial deposits, but lasting for many 

 centuries along with man, on probably to the ninth or tenth a.d., 

 was the Wild Ox {Bos taurus primi genius) , or Urus, once widespread 

 in Europe. Man did not domestic it in Scotland, bat it may have 

 crossed with the Celtic Shorthorn (B. taurus longifrons) which he 

 brought with him when he came. This Urus was a prize, and an 

 agency in the evolution of the qualities of the hunter. As Caesar says: 

 Great is their strength and great their speed ; they spare not man nor 

 wild beast on whom they may cast their eyes. 



The Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) came to Britain from the forests of 

 Central Europe, and was very abundant in Early Scotland, and it 

 is of peculiar interest and importance because it was domesticated 

 here. It seems impossible to draw a line between herds of wild boars 

 and herds of half-domesticated swine. Names hke Boar's Hill and 

 Swinton, as it were join. The Boar was not only a prize and a sifter; 

 it became stock. 



It may seem to some surprising that we are not giving prominence 

 to domesticated animals, for surely they have influenced man and 

 his life more than all the wild animals put together. But the answer 



