Frazer—On a Great Sepulchral Mound. om 
the most valiant king of his time, to the fleet of Gall-Gaedhil, 7.e. they 
were Scoti and foster-children to the Northmen, and at one time they 
used to be called Northmen. They were defeated and slaughtered by 
Aedh, and many of their heads were carried off by Aedh, the son of 
Nial, with him, and the Irish were justified in committing this havoc, 
for these were accustomed to act like the Lochlanns”’ (see p. 129 last 
quoted work). 
It is to these mixed races of Scoti and Danish northern invaders, 
who made constant raids on the Irish coasts during the ninth and tenth 
centuries, that I am inclined to ascribe this extensive massacre of per- 
sons of all ages, young and old, at Donnybrook, and the discovery of 
the different heaps of decapitated heads piled together in the mound 
is one of the reasons, amongst others, which induces me to form such 
an opinion. The piratical bands of Scoti are described by Irish his- 
torians as consisting of “‘ persons who have renounced their baptism, 
and who had the customs of Northmen, and been fostered by them,”’ 
and ‘‘though the original Northmen were bad to the Churches, these 
were far worse.”” The usual places of abode whence these wild Scot- 
tish catherans came were the outlying islands of Scotland, the Cantyre 
coasts, Aran, and the Isle of Man, whence they issued to join the pre- 
datory bands of Norse pirates in their invasions. 
When uncovering such quantities of human remains, lying in close 
proximity to each other as they were examined into with attention, 
several striking results were noticed. Thus Dr. Macalister obtained 
two foetal femora resting undisturbed within the cavity of a female 
os innominatum ; the unborn remains still being within the body of the 
parent. We also found where the hands of the dead had lain across 
their abdomen, that as decomposition advanced the bones of the hands 
fell down into the pelvic cavities, and lay upon the sacrum. In some 
the phalanges had even penetaated within the sacral foramina and 
lodged there. Again, on Nov. 24, 1879, I disinterred an infant’s 
skull, which was crushed in, and within it were the separate bones of 
an adult’s hand, probably its mother’s. ‘To give an illustration of the 
utter confusion in which many of the bodies were heaped together and 
intermingled, there was dug out one firm cohering mass hound with 
the adhesive argillaceous clay as it lay in the ground, which yielded 
two thigh bones placed horizontally in their natural position, a third 
thigh bone that was imbedded between them, and reversed, and two 
leg bones, also in reversed position. Thus it contained portions of 
three different adult human beings, and yet all were gathered lying 
like a bundle of sticks within a bulk so small that I could grasp it in 
my hands. 
It would appear from the result of repeated testings made over 
different parts of the mound, that on the average three separate layers 
of human bodies could be recognised, piled above each other through 
the entire space, yet the vertical depth of the clay stratum within 
which, strictly considered, these bones were imbedded did not exceed 
eighteen inches to two feet. The clay in which they lay was the 
SER. II., VOL. Il., POL. LIT. AND ANTIQ. FE 
