XXXIV 
Sroxr WEAPONS. 
Crircies. 
SEMICIRCLES. 
Pirain CoLumMNs. 
ScuLtpTurED Co- 
LUMNS- 
SGHETLEAND. AND 
this place, were fix pieces of brafs, caft into.a form the neareft refembling fet» 
ters. They were wrapped in a piece of raw hide; but we cannot pretend to. 
fay that they belonged to the occupiers of the camp. ; 
Flint heads of arrows, flint axes, {words made of the bones of a whale, ftones, 
beads, and antiquities, muft be referred'to the earlieft inhabitants, at a period in 
which thefe kingdoms were on a level with the natives of new-difcovered iflands 
in the Soxth Sea. Druidical circles of ftones, the temples of primzval religion, 
of our ifland, are not uncomnmon. The fineft and moft entire are thofe at Stennis, 
in one of the Orkney ifles. The diameter of the circle is about a hundred and ten 
yards. The higheft ftone fourteen feet. The whole is fingularly furrounded 
with a broad and deep ditch, probably to keep at a diftance the unhallowed. 
vulgar, - 
At the fame place is a noble femicircle, confifting of four vaft ftones entire, . 
and one broken. The higheft are twenty feet high above ground. Behind them 
is a mound of earth, conformable to their pofition.. If there never was 2 num- 
ber of ftones to complete a circle, this antiquity was one of the kind which the. 
learned Doétor Borla/e calls a theatre, and fuppofes was defigned for the exhi-= 
bition of dramatical performances *. I fufpeét them to have been either for the 
purpofes of religion, or judicial tranfactions; for the age was probably not fuf- 
ficiently refined for the former amufements. Upright ftones, either memorials of 
the dead, or victories obtained on the fpot, are very numerous. The moft re= 
markable is the ftone of Sators in the ifle of Eda. It is a flag, fifteen feet high, . 
five and a half broad, and only nine inches thick. Its ftory is quite unknown ; | 
but it probably refts over a hero of that name. Notwithftanding the long refi-- 
dence of the Norwegians in thefe iflands, I find only one ftone with a Runic ins 
fcription, which runs along the fides. The reft of the ftone is plain, and defti— 
tute of the fculptures fo frequent on.thofe found in Scandinavia. 
In the wall of the church at Sandue/s, is a ftone with three circles, a femi-- 
circle, and a fquare figure, engraven on it. ‘This is the only one which bears- 
any refemblance to the elegant.carved columns at A@eigle and Glames, and which. 
extend,, after a very long interval, as far as the church-yard of Far, on the ex- 
treme northern coaft of Cathnefs. Several of thefe have been’ before attended to,. 
I can only remark, that they are extremely local, and were, by their fimilarity, 
only the work of a fhort period. We imagine that the firft, about which we - 
can form any conjecture, was erected in 994, on the defeat of Camus, the Dane: 
the laft in 1034, on the murder of Malcolm the Second.. 
* Antig. Cornwall, 195. 
3 Tn 
