140 Archaic Sculpturings. 



Kirkmadrine, Stoneykirk (about 450 A.D.), but some early 

 monuments also occur at Whithorn, all of which have been 

 much written about. The meaning- of most of the symbols 

 and symbol-groups upon these 6g monuments is clearly 

 understood, and there is no difficulty in reading- the lettering- 

 inscribed on a few of them. There is, however, a residuum 

 which involves patterns so recondite and difficult to interpret 

 that few, if any, investigators have attempted an elucidation. 

 It is only this task I shall take up. 



The list of local symbolic and recondite portrayals is as 

 follows : Two hunting horns on the Kirkcolm stone, Wig- 

 tov/nshire ; serpents and an anvil and pincers on the same 

 monument ;i^ a frog-like i-nan with quadruped's ears on the 

 Closeburn monument, Dumfriesshire ; a quadruped with long 

 tongue intertwisted and its legs and tail tripping it up, on the 

 same stone ;ii two discs and the swastika on the Craignarget 

 stone, once at Glenluce, Wigtownshire ;12 a human head with 

 a non-detailed body on one of the Minnigaff slabs, Kirkcud- 

 bright i^^ birds on the same stone, and also on the Kirkcolm 

 cross-slab, and on the Closeburn stone ; the trinity symbol in 

 five variants — (i) three nearly upright parallel lines on the 

 Craignarget stone and on a cross-slab once at Drummore, 

 Wigtownshire, 14 (2) trefoils forming part of early foliageous 

 work at Closeburn, (3) tripartite compartments on each of 

 the two High Auchenlarie pillar-stones, ^^ and (4) triple dots 



10 Stuart, Scidpd. Stones of Scotland, vol. ii., pi. 70; Early 

 Christian Monuments of Scotland — referred to subsequently as 

 E.C.M. — part iii., p. 483, figs. 514 A and B. ; but is best illustrated 

 in the Jteport Anc Mon. Com., WigtojonsJiire. 



I'l E.C.M., iii., 436, fig. 458a. 



1'2 Archl. Coll. of Ayr and Galloway, vii., p. 38; P.S.A.S., xv., 

 251; E.C.M.. iii., 498, fig. 541. 



13 E.C.M.. iii., 477, figs. 507a and b. 



M Archl. Coll. of Ayr and Galloiray, vii., 42; P.S.A.S.. ix., 

 582, fig. 542, front. 



15 Stuart, Sculpd. Stones of Scotland, i., pi. 122; and Mr F, 

 R. Coles' article in P.S.A.S., xxxi., p. 187; E.C.M., iii., 480, figs. 

 509 and 510. 



