392 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



round the Giants' Ein<_r, near Belfast, or round the cist of Longs tone Fort, 

 near Xaas. 1 We must seek another explanation. 



A constant tradition associates stone circles such as this with a dance. 

 Stoneheuge is known to mediaeval writers as Chorea Gigantum. In many 

 places tales are told of dangers who transgressed the hounds of propriety, or 

 who broke the Sabbath, and were as a penalty turned into stone. The stone 

 circle destroyed by St. Patrick represented "Cromm (Jn'iaich" and his attendant 

 deities — that is to say, its stones were aniconic figures of deities; from which 

 we may infer thai stone circles elsewhere are groups of aniconic figures. And 

 it is very important to notice that stone circles as a rule consist of the circle 

 I a single stone either inside or (more often) outside the ring, exactly 

 corresponding to Cromm and his Bub-gods. The circle tailed the "Piper's 



Stone-'' at Hollyw 1. Co. Wicklow— about four miles south of Polla'Phuca 



waterfall— is of thi> type: and here a tale is told of how profane dancers 

 were turned to stone; the outer stone, which someone has tried to consecrate 

 by carving a large ci its top, being the " Piper" who played for the 



dancers. The Geld in which these Btones Btand is called Aughgraney, i.e., 



Aehadh G Sun-field." At Loch Gur, Co. Li rick, is a large circle, 



called on the Ordnance Map Rannwh Cruim Duibh* which looks exactly as 

 though it had been intended for a dancing-place. And in a pattern several 

 tiirn Led iuside New Grange, we Beem to Bee a suggestion of such a 



daie me circle. I n es— jusl the way in which a 



plan ne circle would be roughly sketched in an archaeologist's note- 



1 k round which are traced three concentric cm viug lines representing the 



■ the dancers ; in the centre of the circle is the head of a bull-roarer 

 (fig. I . thai the dai companied by thai instrument 



All these lini I n I not be here enumerated, 



for they are familiar to all ii in the direction of adanct being an 



important I north European religious ritual. The dance was 



on; and its meaning is perfectly clear. 

 It w mpathetic magic, to keep the sun revolving in its 



appoint* I lude that the stones standing round New Grange 



forming an endless sun-dance round 



/ ' i ■ . :. t . 



.'■i|ihy and in topon y the Ordnauce Mae of the Loch <oir district 



1- '- ii'a the greatest possible caution. This meaningless 



ii une Lb i Dhuibh, the " wheels ofCro i Dubh." 



I' i- - ui' >re important than the invention <>f Bome eighteenth- 



rentury hedge schw *ho had read Keating. Some ol the " antiquities " marked 



in tin- mi; ren later invention, 



